


Spook

by TheVagabondBoy



Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: A LOT of Angst, Almost got stabbed there barry-boo, Alternate Universe - Assassins & Hitmen, Alternate Universe - Human, Alternate Universe - No Powers, Alternate Universe - Spies & Secret Agents, Anal Fingering, Anal Sex, And just fuck me up, And then these assholes come along, Angst, Army, Author is procrastinating garbage, Author needs to get their shit together and finish writing this fic, Awkwardness, Barry needs a hug, Being Walked In On, Blood, Canon-Typical Violence, Churches & Cathedrals, Codenames, Coma, Dealing with Past Abuse, Death, Emotional Hurt, Emotional talks in the middle of the night, Fluff and Angst, Government Agencies, Government Conspiracy, Government Experimentation, Grief/Mourning, Human Experimentation, I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping, I feel so many things about this, I have so many emotions, I mean ffs i already have a hard enough time keeping a lid on that shit, Implied/Referenced Character Death, In a way, Joe is scarred for life, Kidnapping, Kinda, Light Angst, M/M, MY EMOTIONS, MY SAD ORPHAN BABIES, Medical Experimentation, Medical Procedures, Medical Torture, Medical Trauma, Mick had weird ways of showing he cares, Military Background, Morning Sex, Orphans, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Past Character Death, Past Child Abuse, Patricide, Police, Priests, Seizures, Sharing a Bed, Sleepovers, Slow Build, Stealth Operations, Talking, Temporary Character Death, That must have been one weird-ass breakfast, Things are getting tense, Torture, Treason, Treasure Hunting, Work In Progress, Wrongful Imprisonment, Youd think they were dead but theyre not, and now im crying, better watch out, but he really does care, dealing with death, everyone does really, he cares so much about len and it gives me life, hes my sweet little homicidal baby, i fucking love mick rory, in a "we have work to do so we're only sleeping bc we'd die if we didn't" kinda way, len needs a blanket and a cup of hot cocoa, like legit, ok i should probs go to bed bc wow look at these shitty tags, oops i forgot one, sorry about that, sort of, the way mick loves len above everything else is so amazing, there we go, title may change
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-07-05
Updated: 2017-05-10
Packaged: 2018-07-21 19:02:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 35
Words: 32,664
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7399900
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheVagabondBoy/pseuds/TheVagabondBoy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Spook (Noun, informal)<br/>1. A ghost.<br/>2. A spy.</p><p>Say what you will about the CIA, but they were anything but boring.</p><p>**THIS WORK IS NOT NECESSARILY ABANDONED, BUT, LIKE, DON'T EXPECT ANYTHING FROM IT???**</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Quick note:  
> In my mind, Barry is 29 years old, and Len is 30. Mick would be a few years older than Len, so maybe 33-35 something maybe?

Paris in June…there was nothing like it, in Barry’s opinion.

The trees were green as emeralds, all the flowers were in full bloom, and the sunsets were to die for. He had a few days off, so he could actually enjoy it for once. He had finished up his latest mission rather quickly, and the bosses had given him a couple vacation days as a reward.

It was nice.

Barry sat on the terrace outside his favorite café, sipping his latte slowly. The people around him were talking softly. Traffic was humming with life. It was everything you could ever ask for.

So why was he _so fucking bored?_

Yeah, the coffee was good, so was the view and the people all seemed nice enough. But where was the excitement?

As if having read his mind, his phone rang and Barry answered quickly.

“Tell me you need me somewhere, Vibe.” he said rapidly. “I love Paris, but Jesus Christ, I’m so bored.”

Cisco laughed. “I got you, boo!” he said, his smile as audible as ever. “Big Boss wants you on a plane to Dublin. We’ve heard whispers of IRA activity, and we need eyes on the ground.”

“Copy that.” Barry said.

He emptied his cup in one go and dropped a couple euros on the table as he got up.

“I can be in the air in two hours.” he said with a glance to his watch. “I’m guessing you got me a ticket.”

“Don’t I always?” Cisco responded. “I had a fresh package delivered to your hotel room.”

“Got it. See you in Dublin, Vibe.” Barry said, smiling to himself

“Catch ya on the flippity-flop, my man!” Cisco said and the call clicked as it ended.

Barry drew his cap a little lower, making sure it obscured his face, but smiled. Cisco always made him laugh, no matter the situatin. He tossed the phone into the street and was satisfied with its destruction when he heard the crack of it being run over by a car. A quick pit-stop at the hotel to grab his gear, then he would become someone new all over again.

Say what you will about the CIA, but they were anything but boring.

*

“Cold.”

“Piper.”

Len didn’t look up as Hartley sat down at the table behind him. They sat nearly back to back. A newspaper rustled. Hartley was making sure no cameras caught him talking to another agent. Len raised his book a little, just enough that it hid his mouth from the coffee shops surveillance cameras.

“What is it, Hartley?” Len asked, turning the page in his book. “Shouldn’t you be babysitting my sister?”

Hartley cleared his throat. He took a deep, shaky breath.

“That’s why I needed to meet with you.” he said. The newspaper rustled again as he turned a new page. “Lisa. She’s…she’s gone.”

“What?” Len said.

He forced himself to stay unmoved. His hand clenched around his cup of coffee. Lisa was…she was gone? She was dead? She had died and no one had told him? No one from the Agency had called to tell him?

“I wanted to be the one to tell you.” Hartley said. “We were in Tokyo. I had orders. They told me she was compromised. They said she had been in contact with China. They said she had stolen information for them. I didn’t wanna do it, I swear. They forced me.”

Len got up. He rounded Hartley’s table and sat down across from him. He ripped the paper out of the agent’s hands, crumpling it up and throwing it aside.

“You killed her.” he bit. “You _murdered_ her.”

“Y-Yes.” Hartley stuttered.

He was crying. His eyes were wet with tears.

“I shot her in the gut.” he said. “She bled out. I…I asked her why. I asked why she would betray her country. Why she’d betray me.” Hartley said. His voice as trembling. “A-And she just laughed.”

“What?” Len said again.

Under the table, he got a hold of the small gun from his ankle holster. Hartley flinched at the sound of the gun cocking.

“Wait!” he said quickly. “Wait! She said something.”

“What was it?” Len asked. “What did she say? What’d she tell you?”

Len wouldn’t believe for a single second that Lisa had done something as stupid as betraying the Agency. It was the only home, the only family, they had known for a long time. She would never have thrown that away. Not without at least telling Len, without giving him a damn good reason for it.

“She said she knew I was gonna do it.” Hartley said, hands flat on the table to show he wasn’t reaching for a weapon. “She said she’d found something. Something bad. Intel on the Agency. That they’re up to something not… _right_.” he explained. “And she said…the only things she was more loyal to than the Agency, was you, Len.”

Lens heart stuttered weakly. He knew it. She had a reason. She wouldn’t leave him there alone; if she had, it was likely that the Agency would send him to eliminate her. It was a thing they did. They liked to have their agents kill their friends, if and when these ‘friends’ went rogue.

“Tell me more.” Len ordered sternly. “Tell me everything you know.”

Hartley shook his head. “I can’t, I don’t know anything more. That’s all she told me.” he pleaded, begging for his life. “That’s it.”

“She didn’t say anything else? Anything at all?” Len asked, kicking him in the shin to remind him that there was, in fact, a gun pointed at him.

“L-Let me think.” Hartley begged quickly.

He was visibly digging through his mind as fast as he could. Len waited patiently. If there was anything, _anything at all_ , that Lisa had said, Len needed to know. He needed to know who had done this to her, and who he would kill for it.

“Y-Yeah. She said she had left the files she had for you.” Hartley said. “She said…you should go where the saints drown their sorrows. I-I don’t know what it means, but she was sure you would.” he said, with a quick nod at the agent sitting across from him. “I’m guessing that’s the point. So no one but you can find it.”

Len nodded.  _Where the saints drown their sorrows?_ What did that mean? Len needed to figure it out. He had to, before anyone else heard about it.

“Len.” Hartley said sharply, snapping the agent back to reality. “Shoot me. Do it. I’d rather you do it than anyone else.”

The agent happily obliged. For the moment, it was payback enough. It would be good enough until he could find whoever put the kill order on Lisa, and end them. The coffee shop was in complete shambles when the two gunshots, heart and head, rang through the place. Len disappeared in the flow of people.


	2. Chapter 2

Dublin was nice too. A little rainy, but still nice. It smelled like wet grass and sun-heated concrete.

Barry hurried through the streets with his coat hugged tightly around him. There was nothing worse than a wet suit. Specially not when you were heading to a meet with an important source. This guy, whoever he was, was deeply embedded in the IRA, apparently, but wanted to get out. He wanted out enough to contact the CIA. It may be 2016, but there were still defectors enough to go around.

“Where are you, Flash?” Cisco asked in his ear. “Our guy is waiting for you.”

“I’m on my way!” Barry shouted over the rain. “A block to go, I think!”

“Copy.” Cisco responded. “Remember, he’s blonde, green eyes. He said he's wearing a leather jacket. And he’ll be by the bar, so just sit next to him.”

“Yeah, I know how to find a CI, Vibe!” Barry argued.

Cisco chuckled to himself but backed off.

*

The informant was good on his word. Barry found the IRA cell right where he had said they would be. He found more than that, though; fifty kilos of semtex, enough to do a whole lot of damage. He called Cisco for orders, and he called the bosses.

Barry took out twenty IRA soldiers. He eradicated the whole cell. There would be no havoc if there was no one there to wreak it. All twenty went down easy; no major fights, a few small scuffles but they were no match for a highly trained CIA operative such as Barry. They were handled in minutes. After loading the semtex into his (stolen) car, digging the slugs out of his victims, and gathering up shell casings, the house went up in flames.

That was Barry’s expertise, making sure every death he caused appeared accidental or self-inflicted. It was much of the reason why he worked alone, and why he was one of the Agencys top operatives. They liked his work; it was clean. There was no mess for them to handle, because he left none in his wake. Cisco had called him, on several occasions, a homicidal neat-freak.

He headed for the US Embassy. There, the explosives were loaded into crates marked as diplomatic pouches, making them immune to search by authorities. And with that, Barry’s work was done. A quick and simple mission, over and done with in just a few hours.

*

The rain pattered against the windows. Jeez, it never stopped raining in Dublin, did it?

Barry was still in bed. The bruises caused by his friends from last night were fresh and just coming to the peak of soreness. Hopefully, he would be able to get his vacation days now so he could recover. Now, Barry was still in tip top fighting shape, but fighting with bruises already covering his body was not really his idea of a good time. Cisco would keep his distance, Barry hoped. He had been Barry’s operator for long enough to know when Barry needed time off.

This was one of those situations; first, a week in Paris chasing down an international fixer who had nabbed a few choice items from the FBI’s evidence lock-up, then an all-night work-over with twenty IRA goons? Barry deserved a few days to lick his wound, at least in his own opinion.

So there he was; a CIA agent, beaten black and blue, with a pair of reading glasses perched on his nose and his laptop laying open in his lap. He may be one of their best and brightest, but not even he could escape the mission reports. And why would a man in his late twenties require extra strong reading glasses? Well, there was an incident in Brazil a few years back. He had taken a few too many punches to the face, so his cornea pretty much exploded on him and the salty sea waters he encountered when he was thrown over the side of a yacht a week, or so, later didn’t exactly help the healing process.

The doctors at Langely yelled at him for a few hours, ordering him to be more careful, but finally gave him a perscription for a pair of glasses. They made him feel old as hell. He was twenty-nine and he could barely read if the text was more than three feet away. He was glad it was the left eye though. He was a righty, so he needed his right eye; couldn't handle a sniper rifle if he couldn't look through the scope. It had been a few years since the incident though, so besides the reading issue, everything was fine. His depth perception was perfect. Compensating for the slightly blurry sight of his left eye was second nature by then.

The thin scar splitting his cornea made him feel distinguished, though. Plus, when people asked, he could always make up the most ridiculous stories.


	3. Chapter 3

What was Len doing?

Was he really doing this? Was he really about to walk out on pretty much everything he had ever known? He had to do it. There was no choice. Lisa was gone, unjustly taken from him, and he would get justice for her. If she had really been killed for information she had stolen form the CIA, Len had to know what that information was. He had to believe that she had had her reasons. For her to do something like that, whatever she had found…it was big. _Huge!_

Len needed to believe it was. He couldn’t bear the thought that maybe she had just decided it was time for a change of scenery. He couldn’t, and he wouldn’t.

He had to figure out her clue. _Where saints drown their sorrows._ It was as if he had heard that phrase before. He could swear he knew it. It itched in his head, picking at his brain. The rest of the saying, because somehow he was certain there was more to it, was at the tip of his tongue but he couldn’t make it actually leave his mouth.

Dammit, Lisa…she always loved puzzles. Puzzles, riddles, treasure hunts. Len remembered back when they were kids, he would spend the whole night setting up a little scavenger hunt for her around the house. Then, she would spend the whole day running around, searing for treasure and solving his clues. She always got it in the end, and was always rewarded; usually just a candy bar or a bag of chips Len had spent all the money he had gotten through picking pockets on buying for her. A few times he had saved up and got her a cool toy, or a coloring book or whatever she pointed at. Len wanted to give her the world. He wanted to give her everything she desired.

This was her way of telling him she remembered too, he supposed. In a way, Len appreciated it. Those memories were nice. The best ones he had. It was kind of her to give him those, even if it was from beyond the grave.

Mick snorted and rolled over on his side. He was still knocked out from the roofie Len had dropped in his drink. If Len was going, he couldn’t let Mick know until there was some distance between them. He would wake up feeling like his head was exploding, but it was a necessary evil.

It was a near certainty that they would order Mick to hunt Len down and kill him. When Mick had his orders, he wasted no time. He went for the kill as fast as he could. Perhaps there would be some modicum of doubt given that it was _Len,_ his partner for more than ten years. Still, Len knew Mick would follow his orders. That was just the way he was, and always had been. It wasn’t something Len blamed him for. He was a soldier through and through. Orders were just his way of life.

Len couldn’t stay for much longer. He grabbed his bag, and the mobile armory they had long since disguised as a regular suitcase. And just like that, just by setting foot outside their hotel room, he was a deserter and a traitor.

He could never go back again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i have so many emotions and such low emotional intelligence


	4. Chapter 4

“The Golden Glider?”

“She’s been handled, sir.”

“And the Piper?”

“He went dark. We believe he sought out Cold, Gliders brother, sir. Piper was found dead in a coffee shop in Belfast, sir. Ballistics match a weapon issued to Cold and his partner.”

“Hm. What about Cold? Where is he? Do we have eyes on him?”

“No, sir. He returned to their hotel then we lost him, sir. We haven’t had eyes on him for roughly three hours.”

“Get our best on it. I want him tracked down, and eliminated. I want Flash, Heatwave, Arrow, Spartan, Speedy, Arsenal, everyone we can spare, I want all of them on him! We _cannot_ let this get out.”

“Right away, sir!”


	5. Chapter 5

_Where saints drown their sorrows._

It was eating at his brain. It was driving him insane! He knew what the phrase was! It was somewhere in there, in his thick head, but it just wouldn’t come out and show itself!

He had to figure it out quickly. It was roughly two hours since he left the hotel. The all-knowing agency probably already had people heading to his last known location. They would only find Mick, asleep on the couch, and not much more. Len had been careful not to leave any traces of him ever being there.

There was no plan as to where he was going at the moment. If he had a plan, he could be tracked. As long as his movements were random and indecisive, he was unpredictable. Until he was at least out of the city, his plan was to not make a plan. No booking tickets, no asking for directions, or checking routes online. With the CIA, all those things could be traced.

Len just had to fall under the radar. Once there, everything would become much simpler. With clean IDs and some cash, the world would be at his fingertips.

*

Barry snatched up his phone as it rang.

“Vibe, I’m taking my vacation days.” he said just a moment after answering.

“Sorry, Flash, that’s gonna have to wait!” Cisco responded. “The Big Boss wants you in Belfast.”

Barry sighed. He took his glasses off, massaging the bridge of his nose. They were really working him to the bone these days.

“What’s going on?” Barry asked.

“Rogue agent.” Cisco said.

_Shit._

Barry hated these jobs. Going after another agent…it was the worst duty they could be given. It was turning on your own kind, turning on another soldier and stabbing them in the back. He had gone on a few of those missions. Each one was worse than the last. But if he didn’t go, they would label him a traitor too and a target would be painted on his back as well.

“Who is it?” Barry asked.

For a second, he prayed that it was no one he knew.

“Leonard Snart, codename Cold.” Cisco responded. “I sent his dossier to your computer. I got a chopper from the US embassy waiting on the roof of your hotel, it’ll take you straight to Snart’s last known location, so get your ass outta bed, Flash!”

Wait, what?

Barry looked over at his laptop, which sat on the dresser. The little light next to the webcam was flashing green.

“Goddammit, Vibe!” Barry said. “I told you to stop doing that!”

*

This Snart guy’s dossier would have been nearly an inch thick if in paper form.

Leonard Snart, codename Cold, thirty years old. In and out of juvie for petty crime, locked up for _Jesus_ second-degree murder at nineteen, recruited out of prison. Genius level IQ, off the charts motor skills, perfect scores on every weapons test, 90% winning rates in hand-to-hand combat. His list of successful missions was a mile long, with uncountable commendations.

If his records did him justice, this guy would be hard to kill. For God’s sake, the guy sounded like a total psycho! The Agency always chose their operatives for a reason; most of them were picked out of a crowd for their ability, and willfulness, to kill on command. The lot of them either had an innate ability to murder without remorse, or had been trained not to feel anything but the recoil of the gun.

Barry was the latter. The army had taken away the remorse pretty quickly. Once the army had chewed him up and spat him out, the CIA was glad to pick up the remains. He preferred not to think back on those days.

Barry grabbed his phone and dialed Cisco’s number, pulling his headset down to hang around his neck instead. Cisco would barely be able to hear him over the noise of the chopper.

“Go for it, Flash!” Cisco said as a greeting.

“I need the surveillance footage from the block around Colds hotel!” Barry shouted into the phone. “Send it to my laptop!”

“You got it, man,” the operator responded. “-but that’s too much footage. You’ll never be able to find him in time.”

“Just do it, Vibe!” Barry ordered before hanging up.

His computer pinged in his lap. Instead of sending the footage to him, Cisco cloned his own screen to it. Barry was put in control of the operator’s station at Langley, after said operator had opened the surveillance footage for him. Barry plugged in the flash drive another operator had given him some time ago. A control window popped open for his use.

The Gaussian filter algorithm was implemented first, which filtered out all the footage where nothing was moving. He then filtered out all the women and men of all races besides Caucasian, leaving them blurred out. After that, everyone shorter than six feet was blurred. Cold would want to shield his face from the camera, so he would be wearing a hat and glasses of some sort. Or maybe not, but it was a risk Barry would have to take by filtering out everyone not wearing anything of the sort.

The time needed to watch all the footage was cut by circa 80% by Barry’s count. Barry scanned the footage for Cold. He had to be there somewhere. He may be trained in the art of avoiding security cameras, like all agents, but even he couldn’t become completely invisible.

“There you are…” Barry said to himself and got his headset back on again to guide the pilot.


	6. Chapter 6

Len had to get out of the country. To do that, he needed a passport. Thankfully, he had built up a ‘friendship’ with several people in the business over the years. At his first chance, he had picked a phone out of someone’s pocket and called his contact in these parts. Len had had to lay low for a bit, while his contact made the product, but they were meeting in a few minutes.

He sat on a bench by a bus stop. His contact would be there soon, he hoped. Not for nothing, but he was getting nervous. With every hour that passed, he could feel more and more agents breathing down his neck.

“Hey.”

Len looked up, relaxing only slightly when he recognized his contact.

“You got it?” Len asked.

“Ye know I do, mate.” the Irishman said.

They both crossed their arms and leaned back. Out of sight for most people, the man handed over the falsified passport and received a bundle of cash in return.

*

Snart had to be somewhere around here. Cisco had tracked him to this block, but he must have found a blind spot to hide in.

_There!_

Across the street, sitting at a bus stop. Barry hurried across the street. He needed to get as close as possible before taking the shot. Any more distance than necessary, and Snart might slip away. Hopefully, he appeared like the average man, running to catch the bus. When Snart didn’t move, Barry believed he was right.

The moment he stepped up on the curb, Barry drew his gun. Snart was faster than his dossier had let on. He was out of his seat as soon as he spotted the move. He caught Barry’s wrist in an iron grip, forcing it away just as Barry squeezed the trigger. Three shots rang out and in a split-second, the street was in an uproar.

Neither of the agents was bothered by the sound. Barry shouted in pain as sharp fingernails dug into his scalp and took hold of his hair. His head was pulled to the side and the gun wrenched out of his hands. With now free hands, he grabbed Snart’s wrist, and threw his head forward, ignoring the sting of his hair being pulled. The move twisted Snart’s arm; he had no choice but to follow along, lest he get his shoulder dislocated.

Barry could free his hair from Snart’s grip. He had the traitor bent over backward, and Barry didn’t hesitate to throw his knee up and strike at his back. Snart let out a short shout, but he knew the same moves Barry did. He easily slipped out of the grapple, drawing the knife sheathed in his boot. Barry showed no hesitance in pulling his own blade. Snart couldn’t dodge every attack Barry threw at him, nor could Barry avoid Snart’s moves. For every strike they landed, they dodged two more, but were weakened still.

Snart won. Barry was already hindered by his older injuries. Snart moved just a little faster, his grip just a little tighter.

He shoved Barry back and Barry stumbled, just far enough for Snart to kick him in the chest. Barry fell back, landing over the bus stop bench. Before he could get up, Snart was on top on him, knee weighing on Barry’s chest and hand locked around Barry’s throat. Barry thought _this was it_ , when Snart raised his knife over his head.

Snart let out some kind of….war-cry, as he brought his knife back down. Barry’s eyes were closed tightly. His heart stuttered when he heard the _thwack_ of the knife hitting the wooden board of the bench instead. Snart had stabbed it through the fabric of Barry’s jacket, keeping him down for long enough to get a head start.

Then Snart was gone. Barry watched in a sort of daze as Snart grabbed his backpack and ran away.


	7. Chapter 7

_Shit!_

They already found him. How the hell did they find him? Len had to get out of the country _now_. He needed to get some distance between him and his would-be assassin. First, though, he needed to get off the streets. He had to re-asses his plans, check what gear he got with him, and count his cash. Last minute plane tickets didn’t come cheap. Not to mention that he had to dump all his weapons before even setting foot in an airport.

The thought of disarming himself in these times made him uncomfortable. There had already been one attempt on his life, and there would certainly be more. He would have nothing to defend himself with. It was a risk he was forced to take now. Either he stayed armed, or he got his ass out of the country.

Len made a sharp turn down a side street and veered into a pub. By looks of the place, he doubted it had any sort of surveillance system, so it was a safe place for now. He slid into a seat far in the back where he was out of sight and ordered a pint from the waitress that came to meet him. As soon as she was gone, he opened his bag and did a quick once over.

A handgun and a few extra mags, a couple knives, a length of rope, a baseball cap and sunglasses, dark blue windbreaker, some IDs he could no longer use, a few bundles of cash, a satellite phone, and a tablet PC. Not too shabby, he supposed, under the circumstances. There was enough cash for a plane ticket, the jacket and cap would do good to alter his appearance.

Len dropped the tablet onto the floor under the table, stepping his heel down on it before kicking it in under the booth seats. He did the same with the phone. Maybe that was how they tracked him down. They were both issued by the CIA, so of course they would be able to trace them.

He kept his head down. The waitress returned after some minutes and set the pint in front of him.

“Miss.” he said, making her stop.

“Yessir?” she chirped happily.

“Is there a computer I could borrow?” he asked. “Just for a couple minutes. I could pay for the time.”

The waitress hummed. “There’s one in the office in the back, but I’ll have to ask my boss about it.” she said.

“Could you? Please? It’s kind of an emergency.” Len lied, begging with just his eyes. “I just found out my sister’s in the hospital back home in the states, and I just need to e-mail my parents, see how she’s doing.”

The waitress sighed softly. For a second, she seemed a little conflicted. Then she nodded and gestured for him to follow. They hurried through the pub and into the back area, past the stocks then into the office. Len took a seat at the desk and brought up the browser.

_Where saints drown their sorrows._

He searched it over and over, changing the phrasing and spelling then just by keywords, but found nothing.

Saints related to drowning? No results worthy of his attention.

Saints related to sorrows in any significant sense? None.

Saints who were killed by drowning? Nothing that Lisa would think he knew about.

 _This goddamn phrase!_ What did it mean? Why did Lisa think he would know it? Len cursed to himself. Okay, think back! In their lives, was there any specific memory related to saints, drowning, or sorrows? It had to be something significant enough for him to actually remember it, yet so obscure that no one but him would be able to figure it out.

He was racking his brain! He searched all of his memories. It had to be in there somewhere. Maybe it wasn’t literal? Maybe it was just a play on words.

_Oh, my God! Len was an idiot!_

_“Where saints drown their sorrows, and sinners get drowned.”_

How had he not thought about that before? The Saints and Sinners Pub, back home in Central City! God, they had gone there pretty much every day after school because Lucy, the owner and bartender, babysat them until their parents got off work. The phrase was some stupid thing Len himself had made up for one of Lisa’s scavenger hunts, when she was maybe fourteen, fifteen?

Len needed to get to Central City.


	8. Chapter 8

Dammit…Snart was gone. Barry lost him.

The knife stabbed through his jacket wasn’t much of an obstacle, it was easily removed, but it offered distraction enough for Snart to make a run for it. He had to leave his suitcase, which Barry found was filled to the brim with weapons. That was good at least. Barry had crippled Snart somewhat. He was most likely still armed, the standard handgun probably, but without more weaponry there was no way Snart could wage war against the Agency. And without weapons, the shooting would be minimal. No civilians would get caught in the middle that way.

At least Barry had been able to slip a tracker onto Snart. He had had it prepped and ready to go, just in case Snart did get away from him. The tracker was a clear Nano-film that stuck to skin and fabric all the same. Once it was on there, it was nearly invisible, unless you knew exactly what to look for. It was a good bet that Snart did know what to look for, but Barry could only hope that he hadn’t noticed it getting placed on the back of his neck when Barry had grappled at him.

Until he realized it was there, Barry could track him wherever he went.

*

Mick jolted awake when a cold glass of water was dumped over him. He sat up in a flash, gasping for air, but froze when a stab of pain shot through his head. _Fuck_ , what happened? He hadn’t had that much to drink last night, had he?

“Rory.” a curt voice said.

Mick jolted again, reaching for the gun in his boot, but calmed when he looked around and saw that there was no threat. Well, no threat to _him_ at least. Oliver Queen and John Diggle, Arrow and Spartan, one of the Agency’s favorite teams. Roy Harper and Thea Queen too, Arsenal and Speedy, a young and up-and-coming team; a rising star within the Agency. What the hell were they all doing there? Where was Lenny?

“What happened?” the curt voice, Oliver, asked sharply.

He clenched his bow tightly in one hand, the quiver hanging over his back. ‘What happened?’ What the hell was that supposed to mean? _They_ were the ones who were all up in Mick and Lens business.

“What d’you mean?” Mick asked, rubbing circles at his temples to calm his headache.

“Where’s Snart?” Diggle asked.

Micks eyes shot up. What? What the hell did that mean? Len was right the-

Mick looked around the room quickly. When he didn’t see the slightest trace of his partner, he was on his feet in the blink of an eye.

“What?!” Mick bit to himself. “He was right here!”

The others sighed seemingly in unison.

“What the hell’s goin’ on, Queen?” Mick growled at the older of the two. “What d’you do with him?”

Queen pursed his lips, looking about as constipated as every other time Mick had seen him. “His sister, Lisa, went rogue. She sold intel to China, so Piper got a kill order.” he explained. “We’re assuming he got one for Cold too. He got the best of Piper though. Now he’s gone AWOL.”

“What?” Mick breathed, slumping back into a seat on the couch.

Lisa went rogue? And…now Len too? No, that couldn’t be right. Lisa would never betray the Agency, and Len even less so. Mick couldn’t believe this. This had to be wrong. A miscommunication, misinformation spread by their enemies. It was impossible.

“They’ve given us all the kill order.” Harper said flatly. “A couple others too. If we don’t do it, someone else will.”

“Do you know where he’d go?” Thea asked.

Her voice was softer than those of the others. She moved around the ornate coffee table to sit down a bit away from Mick.

“Maybe if we find him first, he can explain.” she said. “I know you love Len like a brother. Trust me, I know, I’d never wanna get a kill order for Ollie. But…maybe Len has a reason.” she offered to him, and lay her hand on his shoulder. “Everything he does has a purpose, right?”

Mick nodded. He couldn’t understand this. He couldn’t understand why Len would do something like this. Why he would leave Mick behind. Mick would have assumed that if Len was ever going to go rogue, he would take Mick with him, or at least explain it to him first.

“Then this must have one too.” Thea insisted.

The older agent took a deep breath. He rubbed his hands over his face.

“He has safe houses all over the world.” Mick said. “He always said his favorite was in Tokyo. Got a view of a…a garden or somethin’. A bunch trees with those lil’ pink flowers.”

Oliver hummed. “Sounds like a good start.” he said. “He’s gonna have to regroup and get new IDs, cash, and weapons. We’ll split up and check out his safe houses. Thea, Roy, you go to Tokyo. Mick, can you give them a list of Lens safe houses in Asia and Europe?”

Mick nodded jerkily.

“Good. Check the rest of them out after Tokyo.” Oliver ordered the young bowmen. “Mick, Dig, and I’ll head back to the states. It’s likely that he’ll head there next. It’s his home. It’s where he’ll be most comfortable.”

“Copy that.” Thea and Roy chorused, then headed out.

Fuck, Mick didn’t want to do this. Any of it. Yes, Len may have turned traitor, but he was still as much of a brother that Mick had ever had after his family… Len was his new family, Lisa too. Mick couldn’t believe this was happening. Of all the people he could imagine getting a kill order on, Len wasn’t even close to making it on the list. Even if he was, Mick himself would rather turn traitor than go through with it.

No matter what, he couldn’t bring himself to hurt Len. Not in that way. Not ever in the way that they were now asking of him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There will be more Mick in this story, this is just his first appearance so do be patient! But I do need a little help from you, dear readers! I am a massive slut for ColdFlashWave, but I am also major ColdFlash trash, and now I can't decide which one I want to make the end game! Tell me your opinions, and I will take them into consideration!


	9. Chapter 9

Len did some research during his flight.

Once the guy sitting next to him had fallen asleep, Len borrowed his laptop and thanked the heavens for in-flight Wi-Fi. It was quick and easy work to rout his signal through a few proxies; just a couple, to keep the techs busy for a while if they caught on to what he was doing. He thanked the heavens again for Micks shitty memory, which meant he had made Len memorize his secure log-in as well as his own.

Plus, Micks security clearance was a few levels above Lens so that was nice.

First priority, find out how many agents got his kill order. Sixteen agents, spread out all over the globe. Of course, Mick was on the list, along with a few of their acquaintances. Second priority, figure out who the hell his attempted assassin was.

Len fed in what he could remember of the guys appearance, but was given a list several names longer than he had hoped for. Alright, he got to Len quickly, so he must have been on mission in the UK or Ireland before that. The list got a lot shorter then. It was narrowed down to six names, and from there it was only a matter of taking a look at their pictures. Of course, the man he was searching for was last on the list, because why would he be anything else?

Interesting.

Bartholomew Henry Allen, codename Flash, twenty-nine years old. Recruited out of the army, where he had been _damn_ one of the youngest Rangers in history, graduating top of his class at _nineteen years old_. Far above average IQ, off the charts motor skills, perfect scores on every weapons test, 94% winning rates in hand-to-hand combat. Nearly ten pages listing his successful missions, both for the army and the CIA.

One full year in Afghanistan, eight months in Iraq. Medals, medals, medals, _more medals_. Holy shit, the kid had a Medal of Honor? Like, the _actual_ Medal of Honor? Len had to be honest, that was a story he wanted to hear.

He was a little surprised he had beaten the kid in a fistfight. Going by his records, Len would have assumed Allen would have kicked his ass. Maybe Len just got lucky for once.

*

Barry was on the ground before Snart. The private jet Cisco had acquired for him was much faster than a commercial flight. Snart was still soaring over the Atlantic when Barry landed at Keystone International.

Why was Snart heading to Keystone? He was probably planning on laying low in the states for a while. The Agency was restricted there. Technically, Barry, and every other agent, wasn’t allowed to act on official business in the US. If they were going after him there, they would have to be careful and Snart knew it. Plus, with his old connections in certain criminal circles, Snart could easily buy himself a new identity and protection.

He could, in theory, disappear completely. He could implement his CIA training to shed his identity and reinvent himself completely. He could…retire. Get a house in a suburb somewhere, something with a nice garden. And meet someone to spend all his time with. Have a couple kids. Maybe a dog. Find a boring, normal, nine to five job. That was the dream…

“Barry!”

Barry startled slightly when Cisco shouted in his ear.

“Yeah!” he said quickly. “I’m here. Right here.”

“Uh-huh.” Cisco hummed at him. “Right. Well, Snart’s plane is just about to touch down at gate 6. I’ll track him around the airport, but he should be heading straight to the cabs. Are you there?” he asked.

“Yeah.” Barry said, shifting a little on the seat of his motorcycle. “I’m ready for him.”

The hope was that Snart thought he had lost Barry. That way, he was less on the fence, thinking there was no immediate threat until an open conflict was presented. He would still be looking over his shoulder, of course, but Barry looked innocuous enough to avoid most suspicions. Brightly colored gear, and a neon green bike. Upon first glance, no one would assume he was CIA. Hopefully, Snart wouldn’t see through the misdirection.

“Alright, he’ll be coming out in about thirty seconds.” Cisco said in Barry’s earpiece. “Red baseball cap, blue jacket, and aviators.”

“Copy.” Barry said as he got his helmet on.

He scanned the crowd coming through the multitude of glass doors. For a moment, he feared he had lost Snart in the masses, but exhaled a short breath of relief when he spotted the man. He was barely recognizable under the cap and glasses, but Barry caught him nonetheless. The agent watched as Snart slid into a taxi, and revved up his bike to follow.

*

Snart circled around the city. It didn’t seem like he had an actual destination in mind. Well, perhaps to the untrained eye. Barry caught on pretty quickly to what Snart was doing. The erratic movement, the distinct lack of patterns, he was trying to shake a tail.

Barry followed for a while, then turned off onto a different street. His phone was mounted on the handlebars and the tracker blinked on the screen. He could afford to lose sight of the target as long as he kept an eye on the GPS. After nearly an hour, the taxi came to stop in front of the train station. So Keystone wasn’t the end destination. Barry allowed Snart to enter the station before removing his helmet. The last thing he needed was Snart recognizing his face.

“Vibe, I need you to keep an eye on Cold for a minute.” Barry ordered. “I’m gonna change.”

“Alrighty, my man!” Cisco sing-sang at him.

Barry shed both his jacket and the thick leather trousers. A few sideways glances were thrown his way, but he had no time to think about that. He grabbed a pair of jeans from his backpack, and a hoodie. He also put on a baseball cap of his own; they were remarkably good for hiding from cameras.

“You need to hurry, Flash!” Cisco said as Barry headed into the station. “Cold’s about to get on the express train to Central City. Track six. Fourth carriage from the back.”

“Got it.” Barry said.

What was there in Central City for Snart? It was his hometown, Barry had found out from his file, but it was an obvious move. It was one of the first places where people would look for him. There was undoubtedly already a boatload of agents there, searching the city top to bottom for him. Snart had done so good so far. He had stayed under the radar and the only reason Barry was still on him was the tracker. If not for that, Barry would easily have lost him after their first encounter.

This move…it didn’t make sense. Snart was incredibly intelligent, there was no way he would make a move this predictable so soon. Yes, maybe in a few months he could have returned to his hometown and been relatively safe, but just _days_ after going AWOL? That was not what Barry would expect from him.

Something wasn’t right here. Something was off. An agent as smart and experienced as Snart, would never do something this dumb. Barry couldn’t quite put his finger on it, but something about this whole situation was… _not right_.


	10. Chapter 10

“Sir.”

“Flash. Have you handled Cold?”

“No, sir. I was just wondering, what did he do? I mean, his file doesn’t read like the kind of agent that would go rogue. And there’s something off about how he’s acting.”

“Flash, your job is not to question orders. Your job is not to think. Your job, Mister Allen, is to follow orders. To do as you are told.”

“Of course, sir, but I just think it’s-“

“No, Flash. Handle Cold, and maybe I’ll forget this conversation ever happened. I’ll forget the fact that you _questioned_ a direct order.”

“I…yes, sir.”

*

That was odd. They could at least give him a proper explanation as to why he was hunting Snart like an animal. It would only be fair.

But no, they were completely stone walling him. Barry had made a hundred calls it felt like, and no one could tell him why. _Why_ such a big effort for one rogue agent? _Why_ had Snart even gone rogue? _Why any of this?_ It didn’t make sense. Normally, they would at least give him a quick brief on the rogue agent’s infractions, but on this one he was met only with silence and feigned ignorance. Barry knew better than to press the matter, though. If he did, they might decide that he was becoming an inconvenience and turn the gun on him.

If he wasn’t going to get an explanation out of his superiors, Barry would go right to the source. Barry would seek out the only person who might actually be willing to talk, to tell him what _the hell_ was going on.

Snart himself, God help Barry.


	11. Chapter 11

Saints and Sinners looked exactly the same as it had nearly fifteen years ago, when Len was there last.

Still the same shitty neon sign, which flickered off and on every second on the second. The same stickers and decals glued to the door, just slightly more weathered and worn. It even smelled the same when Len entered. Alcohol, dust, near moldy peanuts, and horrible, deep fried food. Len even recognized a few of the people that sat around.

It was like, in an instant, he was transported back to when he was thirteen, walking into the bar with Lisa’s hand in a tight grip and her pink backpack hanging over his shoulder beside his own.

Lucy stood behind the bar, shining a beer mug with a dirty rag. She looked up when the door opened and seemed to recognize Len right away since a warm smile filled her face.

“Lenny!” she said happily, waving him over to her after tossing the rag aside.

“Hey, Lucy.” Len said, smiling as well.

It was good to see her again. Her hair was a little grayer, the lines on her face a little deeper, but she still shone like the sun when she smiled. They hugged over the counter before Len took a seat on a stool.

“I’m thinkin’ I know why you’re here.” Lucy said.

Her smile was a little smaller then.

“Lisa.” Len said. “She was here?”

Lucy nodded. “Yup. She said you’d be stoppin’ by.” the bartender said. “Left somethin’ for ya, kid.”

Thank God. He had been right after all. He had hesitated slightly, on the train from Keystone. Thought that maybe, _just maybe,_ his mind was playing tricks on him. It had been so many years since that phrase was made up that maybe he was remembering it wrong. But this was the end of the road. Lisa had lead him here, back home, and now he could clear her name! Prove to the Agency that she was no traitor!

“I’ll go get it for ya.” Lucy said. “Lil’ Lis made me out it in the safe.”

The woman hurried out from behind the bar and scurried away into the back rooms. Len waited. His fingernails tapped against the counter in a rapid rhythm, eyes darting around nervously. Now, of all times, he couldn’t let anyone sneak up on him. It could ruin everything. If he got his brains blown out now, both he and Lisa would be remembered as nothing but a pair of traitors.

Len already knew what people would say about them. _Once a criminal, always a criminal._ Their records weren’t exactly one of the Agency’s most well-kept secrets. Everyone they had ever worked with had had access to at least parts of their dossiers. They knew about what Len had done, what Lisa had done. Their petty crimes, the stints in juvie, Lens murder charge.

He had to win this fight. He had to prove that they had been _nothing_ but loyal to the Agency form the day they had joined.

Lucy came back out, a folded up envelope in one hand. She leaned on the counter in front of Len and offered the envelope to him.

“You watch you back now, kid.” she said, pulling the paper back when Len reached for it. “Got it?”

Len couldn’t help but smile again. “Got it.” he repeated.

He reached out to take the envelope again. Len felt the smooth paper under his fingers for half a second, before it was snatched away. Not by Lucy this time.

Allen!

The kid was across the pub in a moment, his back to the wall as he tore open the envelope and got a slip of paper out of it. Len leapt out of his seat and ran at him. _No!_ This bastard wouldn’t take this from him! Len wouldn’t let him!

“Ah, ah, ah!” Allen tutted, suddenly holding a lighter in one hand and the crumpled up note from the envelope in the other.

Len skid to a stop.

“Don’t!” he shouted and raised his hands in surrender.

He couldn’t burn it! No, no, no, no! Lens heart was racing. Allen couldn’t do this to him!

“Don’t!” Len shouted again. “Please! Please don’t!”

“I just need to talk to you!” Allen shouted back. “Just listen, okay?! Just hear me out!”

Lucy seemingly appeared out of nowhere beside Len, with a shotgun in hand.

“Everyone get out!” she ordered, pumping up a shell.

The pub was empty, save for the three of them, in a flash.

 _Fuck!_ Len couldn’t fucking breathe. If Allen clicked the lighter just _once_ , that note would go up in smoke. It would be gone and unsalvageable, and only Allen himself would know what information that it contained.

“Please. Please, just give it to me, okay?” Len pleaded. “Just hand it over. Please.

Allen shook his head quickly. “No. No, you need to listen to me first.” he said sternly.

Lucy growled beside Len, clutching her shotgun tightly. “You want me to blast him, Lenny?” she asked and seemed quite eager to do so.

“No.” Len said. “Okay. Okay. I’ll listen.” he promised. “Talk. Talk away. I’m listening.”

Allen nodded. He took a deep breath. His hands were shaking and he was sweating almost profusely.

“I was ordered to hunt you down.” Allen began. “I followed orders and I tracked you in Belfast, to Keystone, to here. But…but this didn’t make sense. Why the hell would you do something as stupid as go to your hometown if you’re literally on the run from the government? It was stupid and predictable, and not something the Leonard Snart I read about would do. _Ever_.” he insisted. “So I called around, and no one said a thing. They wouldn’t even tell me why you met with Piper! _And that_ _doesn’t make sense!_ So explain!”

“What?” Len said.

The kid was talking so fast that Len had barely caught half of it.

“Explain!” Allen ordered him. “Explain to me _why_ you came here, _why_ you’re on the run, and _why_ they want you dead so badly that they sent every available operative after you!”

Fucking hell…the kid had done some thinking. He had started to question orders. Never a good thing for a CIA operative. Len didn’t want to explain. He didn’t want to drag anyone else into this, put a target on anyone else’s back, no matter how much he disliked them or just plain didn’t know them at all. No one deserved to be hunted like he was, not even this cocky little shit.

But…it wasn’t as if he had a choice. If he said yes, Allen would just be another kill order, another fugitive. If he said no, Allen would burn the note and Len would be forced to drag him into it anyway.

“Okay.” Len said. “Okay, I’ll explain.”


	12. Chapter 12

They sat in a booth, across from each other.

Barry had been made to leave his weapons on the bar and Lucy had patted him down thoroughly, on Lens behest. Barry still clutched the paper tightly in his hand, but had handed over the lighter to Len. Needless to say, it was tense.

“So correct me if I’m wrong.” Barry said. “Your sister, the Glider, got her hands on some intel on the CIA, got labelled a traitor and killed for it. And now you’re making the exact same mistake?”

Len shook his head. “It’s not a mistake.” he said sternly. “Whatever this intel is, it’s bad enough that the Agency is snuffing out anyone who so much as hears about it. If it _is_ that bad, it needs to be put out there. They need to be held accountable, just like everyone else.”

Barry hummed to himself. This sounded terrible. He saw no end to this where they weren’t all lying dead in pools of their own blood. But…Snart, Len, was kind of right, Barry had to admit. If it was as bad as it sounded, someone needed to blow the whistle on it. If it was that bad, they couldn’t let it go on, they couldn’t be part of the cover-up.

“Okay.” Barry said. “You're the meanest old woman that I ever have seen.”

“What?” Len said, confused as hell by the latter statement.

Barry shrugged. “It’s what it says.” he said.

He unfurled the crimpled up piece of paper, flattening it against the tabletop then slid it over to the other man. Len read it quickly. Over and over, he read the words, written in his little sisters neat handwriting. He knew those letters so well, like the back of his hand. But again, Lisa’s clue made no sense. _You're the meanest old woman that I ever have seen?_ Len didn’t know what that meant. He looked up at Barry quite expectantly, but the agent simply shrugged again. He didn’t know it either.

Len just needed to think it over again. _You're the meanest old woman that I ever have seen._ Once again, he recognized the phrase but couldn’t quite place it. The first phrase had been related to Len and Lisa’s lives, it had brought Len to a place they had frequented for as long as he could remember. Maybe this one would too.

Places related to the phrase? None.

Places related to mean women? None.

Places related to old women? None.

_Fuck, Len wanted to punch something!_

He slammed his hand down on the table in anger and exasperation. Why couldn’t Lisa just have told him where she had hidden her intel? Why couldn’t just have picked up a goddamn phone and told him what was going on?

“Cool it, Len.” Barry bit at him.

“Hey, fuck you.” Len retorted. Yes, not his proudest moment. “My sister’s dead and we’re chasing a ghost! How the _fuck_ am I supposed to cool it?!”

Barry sighed, but leaned forward on his elbows. “Take a deep breath.” he said.

“Fuck off.” Len said tiredly, rising to get out of the booth.

He froze when Barry’s hand wrapped around his wrist. It wasn’t a tight grip. Not even enough to slow him down, but still it made him stop.

“Just do as I say, okay?” Barry asked.

Len snatched his wrist out of the agent’s hand, but sat down again. When Barry said nothing, Len made a ‘get on with it’ gesture, which made the other man roll his eyes.

“Take a deep breath.”

Len inhaled slowly through his nose, and exhaled through his mouth.

“When you figured out the first clue, how did you do it?” Barry asked.

“I was…thinking about Lisa. And me. Everything we’ve been through.” Len said. Even he noted that his voice lacked its usual venomous edge. “About when we were kids. And about how she loved treasure hunts, like this one. So I’d…I’d make them for her. Make up clues and hide them around the house, sometimes the whole city when she was a little older.”

Barry nodded along as Len spoke.

“And if it was you who made up this clue, where would it take Lisa?” he asked.

Len shrugged. “I always chose places we knew pretty well. They were the easiest to make clues for.” he said. “And this one…”

He looked down at the paper again, as if there would be something there that he had missed.

 _“Oh, woman, oh, woman, don’t treat me so mean! You’re the meanest old woman that I ever have seen.”_ Len sang then, the words coming out without his control or his permission. _“Well, I guess if you say so, I’ll have to pack my things and go.”_

“Hit the road, Jack!” Barry exclaimed. “The song! It’s a song!”

Len nodded eagerly. Oh, yes! Progress! It was a song, a jazzy song. Ray Charles, if Len wasn’t mistaken. What did that song have to do with their lives? Major events, memories that would stand out in crowd!

He tapped at the paper almost in excitement. “After Lisa was put in the field for the first time, we met up at the Back Room Jazz Bar, down on the south side.” he said quickly. “I think we danced to that song.”

“That must be it.” Barry said. “Let’s go. I have a car up the street.”


	13. Chapter 13

The city was bigger than Barry remembered. And it had changed a lot. He hadn’t been back there in a few years. The CIA weren’t exactly big on letting their agents go back home. Maybe because it would remind them of how fucked up their lives and jobs were. Of the fact that normal people didn’t travel around the world and kill people on a nearly daily basis.

They cruised through the city streets in silence. They didn’t speak to one another, not a single word. Then again, just hours ago Barry had still been on a mission to kill Len, and Len had had no doubts about killing Barry if it came to it.

Now they were working together. Sort of. Barry hadn’t given Len much say in the matter.

“Turn left up here.” Len said, pointing ahead at the next intersection.

“Got it.” Barry hummed, sliding into the proper lane. “So. Um. You should…you should check the back of your neck.”

Len gave him a sideways glance, but did as instructed. At first, he felt nothing but his own skin and the short, soft hairs on the nape of his neck. Then his fingers hit an unnaturally smooth spot. What? How had he not noticed that before?

“Really?” he huffed as he removed the film. “You had to tag me?”

Barry shrugged, but smiled at him. “Lead me right back to you, didn’t it?” he said.

“Yes, after I beat you up.” Len drawled as he dropped the film out the window. “I have to say, you were easy to beat. For a former Ranger, I mean.”

Len saw how the smile on Barry’s face disappeared in practically an instant. Sore subject? Len made a note of it, filing it away in his head. Something to inquire further on at a later time.

“Yeah, well, I took down twenty IRA goons the night before.” he said flatly. “So there’s that.”

Len nodded to himself. Decent reason as to why he was off his game. Possible injuries, definitively a couple bruises. Anyone would be slowed by it, so he couldn’t really hold it against the guy. Len was actually a little impressed, if he was going to be honest. Twenty guys? Not something you did every day. Certainly not on your own. Len had to say, he wouldn’t mind going another round after this was all over. Just to see what the kid was really made off, no injuries getting in the way.

“I guess you read my file then.” Barry continued, clearly trying to shift the topic of conversation. “How? The Agency would’ve suspended your account by now.”

“Yeah, I used my partners log-in.” Len admitted. “Medal of Honor?”

Barry’s grip on the steering wheel tightened. He blinked twice, and swallowed. All signs that he was uncomfortable with the implied question. Hm, another sore subject.

“Let’s get something straight.” Barry said.

His voice was firm, but flat. He was doing his best not to get emotional and it was obvious. His time in the army had clearly come to a less than favorable end. Len made another mental note, to not bring it up again.

“I don’t trust you and I’m pretty damn sure you don’t trust me either,” Barry said, eyes firmly locked on the street ahead of them. “-but we’re in this together now. If we’re gonna make it out alive, we need to play nice. You won’t talk about the army, and I won’t bring up that murder charge I read about.”

Well…that shut Len up.

But since he wasn’t particularly eager to talk about his own past, he supposed it was a fair agreement.

“Okay.”

Barry cleared his throat. He shifted in his seat.

“How much further to this bar?” he asked.

Not only because he wanted to know, but also because he wanted to ease the tension. If they were going to work together, they were going to have to actually cooperate, no matter how little they trusted each other.

“Should be a few more blocks.” Len responded. “Do you have any safe houses in the city? I’d offer one up, but I haven’t exactly been a regular visitor.”

Barry huffed, his grip of the steering wheel beginning to loosen again. “And you think I have?” he asked.

“It’s your hometown too.” Len drawled. “And you work alone. I assume you get a little more down time than the rest of us. Not much work out there for a solo operation.”

“I have a place.” Barry said then, shrugging again. “Sort of.”


	14. Chapter 14

They called off the search of Asia. After Lens picture had finally been released to the TSA, and other agencies of the like, a sighting was reported. Some airport worker in Belfast had checked his passport and let him on a flight before the alert was issued; at least now, they knew where he was going and what name he had travelled under.

Harper and the younger Queen were re-routed to Keystone, while Mick and his… _team_ continued on to Central City. Since it was Lens hometown, they were betting on him going back there. It was a longshot but it was the best lead they had so far. Len was literally trained to avoid detection and escape pursuit. The only difference now, was that it was the Agency itself following him; the very entity that had taught him these things.

Mick had a few ideas as to where Len might be hiding out. A few places Len had mentioned, some stuff he had overheard from Lens phone calls with Lisa. Mick was hoping that Len wasn’t at any of them. That he had simply made a quick stop in the city before moving on. His fantasies were probably too good to be true. Len was probably sitting in some back room somewhere, already making shady deals to start his new life as a fugitive.

Queen and Diggle talked about Len like he was just some common criminal. Like he hadn’t spent the last ten years of his life waiting on the Agency’s damn hand and foot, following every single order.

Mick hated them. _He fucking hated them!_ How could they talk about Len like that? How could they be planning how to kill Len when Mick was _right there next to them?_ How could they so easily abandon one of their own? A brother in arms who had gladly covered their six on joint operations?

They looked up when Mick got up from his seat at their table.

“Where are you going, Rory?” Queen called after him as Mick headed for the apartment door.

“Anywhere that ain’t got you two in it!” Mick shouted back.

The apartment door slammed shut behind him.

Mick couldn’t so this. He needed to find Len first. Convince him to just turn himself in and maybe escape a death sentence if he was cooperative.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> my sON


	15. Chapter 15

Len remembered the Back Room Jazz Bar vividly.

He had walked in and immediately been assaulted by the smell of cigarette smoke and fine whiskeys and brandies. He had sat down at a table with a view of the doors; to the bathrooms, to the kitchen, and the entrance itself. Lisa had entered after a while, some minutes maybe, and scanned over the place in seconds. Just like Len had, just like they had been trained. She had smiled so beautifully when she spotted him. They nearly ran to each other. But Len shook his head minutely, and she had caught the drift. Lisa had all but glided across the place and taken her seat so gracefully.

She had worn a black blouse that day, and jeans that had been pale before she laid a single finger on them. A flattering lipstick, and matching nail polish.

To think about her now, was to be in pain. Lens whole body ached with the grief, and the _anger._ Len couldn’t put into words how incredibly _furious_ he was over it all. He bit down on it though. He choked it back. Now was not the time for anger. If they could just get these files Lisa had found, they could expose…whatever this was! If they could get it out there, then maybe it would be justice.

Barry came inside with him for a moment, to help make sure the area was secure and no security needed to be handled. Once Len had established that the place was exactly as he had left it, the second rogue stepped outside again. It was for the best; Len didn’t need a babysitter.

He took a seat at the bar. It seemed there had been a lot of that going around lately.

The bartender was quick to greet him with a smile. “Hey, man!” he said. “What can I get ya?”

Len smiled back, of course. “I think my sister was here a while ago, maybe a few weeks.” he said, but kept it a little vague. If this wasn’t her contact, Len didn’t want to spread information around. “She said she left something here and asked me to come pick it up.”

The bartender, _Nash?,_ hummed. “Maybe. What’s her name? Maybe I know her?” he suggested.

“Lisa.”

“Lisa?” Nash repeated. “Kinda tall? Black hair, blue eyes? Really pale lookin’?”

Len scoffed at the description but nodded. “Yeah, that’s her.” he said.

“Yeah, she was here.” Nash said as he ducked under the bar.

He dug around under there, it sounded like, for some moments before remerging. He handed over an envelope.

“Said you’d come lookin’ for it sometime soon.” he said. “Also said that if you didn’t show up within a month and a half, I’s supposed to burn it and forget I ever met her.”

Hm, a predictable move. A safe guard. In case Len got caught, or someone else found out about the clues before Len could get to them, or a hundred different scenarios. Now was not the time to think too much about what could have been. Just like the grief…it could wait until this was over and done with.


	16. Chapter 16

Ah, shit…

Barry regretted this the moment he turned the car onto the street. It was a bad idea. The worst, possibly. Doing this…it would only put them in danger. But they knew how to handle themselves, and no one knew Barry was working with Len so no one would be looking at him or his background. Neither of them had any safe houses in the city, nor could they just check into a hotel. It was a…rational decision to make, he supposed. Still, he was hesitating.

Barry parked the car up the street, but made no move to get out. Len noticed this of course, and didn’t move either.

“Where’s the safe house?” he asked, looking around the neighborhood for a house that stood out.

“It’s…it’s not a safe house. Per se.” Barry said.

Len shrugged. “Then what is it?” he asked.

Barry breathed deeply. Bad idea. Bad, bad, _bad idea!_ Almost ten years and about as many phone calls, even fewer visits. They wouldn’t be happy with him.

“Home.” he said. “It’s home. My home. My…my sister and my adopted dad. Adopted sister.”

Color Len surprised.

But, sensing that Barry needed his mind taken off the deeper aspects of the matter, he opted for a joke instead of some supportive bullshit pep-talk.

“Well, well, well, Barry Allen.” Len said with a smirk. “Second date and you’re already bringing me home to meet the family?

Barry actually snorted at it, shaking his head as he laughed softly.

*

Barry knocked on the door. It was late, but there were a few lights on still. Joe had to be home at least, his car was in the driveway. But Iris was a different matter. For all Barry knew, she had moved out a long time ago.

The door swung open and…

“Iris.”

“Barr?” the girl, woman, said in equal parts shock and awe.

He nodded jerkily. Well, he was, until Iris threw her arms around him and he could almost feel his ribs start to give out because she was hugging him so tightly.

“Oh, my God, Barry! We haven’t talked in so long! I missed you so much!” she rambled right into his war. “Why haven’t you been back sooner? No, it doesn’t matter! I guess your hob in Australia _is_ pretty important!”

“Who’s at the door, honey?!” a voice came from deeper inside the house.

Barry recognized it instantly. Joe! _God,_ Barry had missed them both so much.

Iris finally released him, taking a small step back. “Dad! Come here! You’re not gonna believe it!” she yelled back.

“Alright, alright, I’m comin’!” the detective said, appearing in the hallway.

Iris stepped aside, which put Barry in plain view. Joe eyes widened when he spotted Barry. It was a repeat performance. He hugged Barry so incredibly tightly, one hand cradling the kids head as it always did. Barry just hugged him back, his arms wrapped around Joe and clutching onto his shirt as if keeping him in place.

“Oh, God…Barry, you’re here.” Joe said softly.

They were both still surprised. Barry hadn’t been back home in almost three years now. Barry himself could barely breathe. This wasn’t exactly how he had wanted to come back, dragging a hundred tons of shit with him, but he was so glad he ended up there. Despite it all, he was glad he was home again. No matter what came next.

“Who’s your friend?” Joe asked once they parted.

 _Oh, shit, right!_ Len was there too, still standing out on the porch steps. Barry quickly gestured for him to come inside and closed, and locked, the door behind him.

“This is…Len.” Barry said sheepishly. “He’s a…a colleague. Kinda. We’re…”

“We’re working together on a project.” Len filled in, since Barry obviously wasn’t good at lying to his family. “We ended up in the city, it was last-minute kind of thing. We couldn’t find a hotel. Barry said we could stay here. Just for the night.”

Joe and Iris both nodded eagerly; they were visibly excited by the prospect of having Barry back in the house, back at home.

*

Len couldn’t stop himself.

After dinner, which was a very awkward affair, he took a look around the house. Snooping through other people’s business was his job. Well, former job now, but still! He was a curious person.

Most of all, he wanted to figure out how Barry had ended up with the Wests. He didn’t have that air about him that people had after going through the system.

There were some pictures on the mantle that caught Lens attention. In the one farthest to the left, there was a man and a woman, standing in front of a house. The woman had a baby in her arms, bundled up in a blanket. Brown hair, blue eyes? The baby was Barry. The man and woman must be his real parents. In the next photo there was only the man, Barry’s father. He stood in a desert, dressed in a military uniform. He was obviously on tour, but there was still a smile on his face. Len could see a few of the tags on his uniform; he was an army medic.

In the third, Joe and Barry’s mother sat next to each other on the hood of a police car, smiling brightly at the camera. They were both in the blue uniforms, badges glistening on their chests. Maybe they were partners, and that was how Barry ended up with Joe? It was a common practice that a cop made their partner the godparent of their child. So…then both Barry’s parents must have died in the line of duty. It was the most logical conclusion when considering they were a cop and a soldier.

Len would have to ask Barry about it. Now that his curiosity had been piqued, it needed to be satisfied.


	17. Chapter 17

“So.” Len said, rolling out the sleeping bag Joe had dug out of a closet for him. “Australia?”

Barry made a low noise. A hum, a huff of acknowledgement. He sat down on the edge of his bed, looking at Len who sat on the floor next to the sleeping bag.

“It’s…” he said. “I told Joe. When I was recruited. Told him all about it. That…I’d be a field agent. Running around saving people.” Barry explained softly. “He made me swear I wouldn’t tell Iris. So I told her I was just gonna be a clerk at a CIA office. In Australia.”

He shrugged. Lying had seemed…appropriate at the time. He hadn’t argued with Joe on it at all. Barry would be, as stated, running around saving people, and putting his own life on the line all through it. And he had, for the last ten years almost. Iris would just have been worried about him. She would have just spent all her time thinking about him, worrying about him, and forget to focus on her own life.

Len crawled into his sleeping bag, while Barry tucked himself into bed. Joe was walking around downstairs still. Probably doing his last checks on the doors and windows, making sure everything was locked and bolted. It was odd. Len felt…safe. He usually never did. Wherever he went, he was always on his guard. But here, it felt safe. It was a strange feeling. Maybe that was why he opened his mouth.

“I’ll make you a deal, Barry.” he said. “An answer for an answer.”

“An answer to what?” Barry asked.

He sounded as if he was actually contemplating the offer.

“Whatever question you got.” Len said. “An answer for an answer, like I said.”

Barry hummed. He was quiet for a moment.

“Deal.”

“What happened to your parents?” Len asked, cutting in before Barry could ask his question.

The agent scoffed. He had realized that this was where Len was going with this deal. But, it was a chance for Barry to get some answers out of Len too, so he supposed he would have to play along.

“My dad, he…he was an army medic. Saved a lot of lives.” Barry said, staring up at the ceiling. “All I ever wanted was to be like him. Truck went over an IED and he died.”

He hadn’t talked about it. Ever. Not to the people from Child Protective Services, the army psychologists or the CIA psychologists. A lot of doctors had come and gone, and no one had gotten a word out of him about it.

“And your mom?” Len asked.

“She was a cop.” Barry said. “She died too, a while after my dad. Caught in a shoot-out with some scumbag meth-head. Then Joe, my godfather, adopted me.” he said. He had answered the question, but the words wouldn’t stop coming. “After dad died, I decided I was…I was gonna be the best goddamn soldier in the world. Enlisted on my eighteenth birthday. Shipped out just a couple weeks after boot camp. Got lucky and was promoted to Sergeant pretty quickly, so I went into Ranger school before I was nineteen. Youngest guy there. Graduated top of my class.”

He supposed Len would have asked that question anyway.

“How’d you end up in the CIA?” Len asked when Barry didn’t speak for some seconds.

Barry cleared his throat. Fuck, he wanted to cry. All these memories that were coming back, things he had done his absolute best not to think about since they happened. Things he had forced back down inside himself, things he had hoped he would never have to talk about or experience again.

“Got contacted by some…higher-up in the Agency when I was twenty-one. Said it was an opportunity to do more for my country than I’d ever do as a Ranger. And…I believed her.” Barry said. His voice was quite low, just a little more than a whisper. “You? How’d you end up…here?”

Len sighed. He wanted to talk about his past about as much as Barry did. He too wanted to forget and repress. But a deal was a deal, and Len didn’t go back on a deal.

“Dad was a cop. A dirty one. He…uh, he beat on me and my sister.” The words almost didn’t want to come out of his mouth. “Mom too before she died. I was in and outta juvie on a regular basis. Only stayed a couple weeks at a time because dad was friends with the warden. I…I killed him when I was nineteen. I’d had enough. He was beating Lisa up and I just…snapped. Grabbed a knife in the kitchen and stabbed him more times than I care to remember. Got locked up for it.” Lens heart was pounding like a drum in his chest. “Some CIA asshole visited me in the slammer. Said he could make it go away, but I had to come work for them. They must’ve wanted me really bad because I talked him into recruiting Lisa too, when she got old enough.”

Len hated himself. He had dragged Lisa into this world. If he had just left her behind, she would hate him, but she would be alive; maybe in prison for some minor shit, but she would be alive and well somewhere in the world.

“Why do you work alone?” Len asked, eager to move on from… _that._

“Easier that way.” Barry said lowly. “No one but me is around to get killed.”

It made sense. Len supposed that Barry feared that he would screw up, and someone else would pay for it. Len was afraid of that too. Every time he and Mick went on a mission, Len was afraid that he would mess up; miss a detail and get Mick killed. It was why he had left Mick behind on this one. There were kill orders on them now, one mistake and that was the end.

“And you?” Barry asked. “Why did you choose to have a team? A partner?”

Len exhaled softly. “Didn’t really get a choice. Mick was my mentor when I joined the Agency, after the Farm.” Len said. “He took me on a few of his missions, to get me used to the work, you know? And we just stuck together. He’s…he’s family.” he said to himself.

“That sounds nice.” Barry said.

He wondered if he would feel the same if he had had a partner. If Barry would make a family for himself that way. Maybe…maybe once they got this all over with, he could request a partnership. He would even consider taking on a rookie, if no fellow agents wanted him.

“To have family with you like that.”

Len couldn’t help but smile at the thought. “Yeah. It’s pretty nice.” he agreed.

Neither of them spoke.

The house was quiet then. Iris was long since asleep, and Joe had gone to bed by now.  The room was so dark neither of them could see much. Barry still remembered every detail of the room though, he could walk around it in the dark; he could close his eyes and still run his hands over the dresser, and along the spines of the books on the shelves. He could duck under the model fighter jet that hung from the ceiling by the window.

Len lay on the floor by the foot of Barry’s bed.

“What’s the next clue?” Barry asked.

He didn’t want to think about any of this. He didn’t want to talk about it anymore. He wanted to be _done_ with all of this so he could get back to normal; get back to being one of the good guys, and chasing bad guys.

Len didn’t say a word about it. He pulled the unopened envelope out of the pocket of his jeans, which lay on the floor next to him. They had been a little busy getting somewhere safe to spend the night to focus their attention on the clue. Sadly, it had to wait; in this fight, sleep and food won out. They needed to actually be able to _function_ if they were going to solve and follow the clue.

 _“He was a vile and sick thing.”_ Len read.

Well, fuck.

Len knew exactly who _‘he’_ was, and he knew where this was leading them. After their conversation, he guessed that Barry realized too.

“It’s right.” Barry said. “Your father was an awful person. He deserved what you did to him.”

“I know.” Len said.

He knew Lewis Snart deserved death and much more. He had deserved to be tortured until the end of time. He had deserved to kicked and beaten until he _begged_ for forgiveness for all the shit he had put his family through.

Len crawled back out of his sleeping bag. He rounded Barry’s bed and turned the bed side light on. Barry had a sad look on his face, just like the one Len himself wore. Still, neither of them spoke. It was a single bed, but Barry moved to one side as best he could and pulled the covers back. Len laid down next to him.

It was… _safe._


	18. Chapter 18

Len woke up at six AM on the dot, like always.

What was not like always, though, was the fact that when he opened his eyes, he was staring straight at Barry. Oh, right, he had sort of climbed into bed with Barry the night before. Not for any other reason than that they had both needed the comfort, of course. Len would have liked to think that some trust had been built between them. Barry had taken him home, for God’s sake. You didn’t do that with people you didn’t trust. There was a little trust, yes, but not much else really. They both wanted to get to the end of Lisa’s scavenger hunt, and go their separate ways. They would…probably never see each other again after it was done.

Why was that such an awful thought?

“Len.”

Lens eyes refocused, and he realized that Barry had woken up. Why hadn’t he realized before? How long had they been staring at each other? It…didn’t seem so bad; laying there in bed together, just looking at one another on a lazy morning.

“We should get up.” Barry said.

His voice was hoarse from sleep.

“Yeah.” Len responded.

But neither made a move.

Then they both moved all at once.

Barry lunged at Len and Len gladly welcomed him with open arms. Len was thrown over onto his back and Barry landed on top of him. Their foreheads knocked together slightly as their lips met, but it didn’t matter at all. Lens hands moved on instinct, pulling Barry’s body closer as they slid over his body and found a nice foot-hold on his ass. Barry just ran his hands over Lens head and shoulders, and felt over the hard muscles of his chest and arms.

 _Shit!_ Len needed this, he wanted it. Why did he want it so bad? Why did it matter, he _needed_ Barry right now! Right this second and he couldn’t wait.

“Barry,” Len said between kisses. “-Barry, condoms, now.”

The man nodded against him and whined softly as he pulled back. Barry leaned over to the nightstand. He got the drawer open, digging through it quickly. He got a half-full bottle of lube of it, but…

“Fuck, they’re expired.” Barry groaned, as Len squeezed his ass and used the leverage to grind Barry’s hips down against his own.

“Expired?” Len sighed.

“Haven’t been back in three years,” Barry said, but smiled. “-didn’t really stock up on the way here either.”

Len chuckled as he moved one hand to Barry’s neck, pulling him back in for a warm kiss. He got his other hand in between their crotches. Barry made a keening noise against Lens mouth. It wasn’t exactly what they wanted, but _holy shit, it was definitively good enough!_ Barry sat up, knees falling to support him on either side of Lens hips. He pulled Lens tenting boxers down and the man’s cock bobbed as it was freed. Barry pushed his own underwear down his thighs as far as he could. They kissed again as Barry ground his body against Lens, their cocks sliding against each other’s hip.

“Yeah, fuck, like that…” Barry breathed when Len rutted against him too.

His hands came to Barry’s ass again, to hold him in place, and he continued rutting. It was so good when they moved together. Barry wanted more and more and _more._ He wanted to be fucked until he screamed; oh, god, it had been a long time since he had sex. He couldn’t exactly head into a bar and just pick someone out of the crowd to take home. Nothing was that easy, not with his job. But _Jesus_ , Barry wished it was. He wished he didn’t lay in bed every night, fingering himself to his fantasies.

“You clean?” Len grunted into his ear suddenly.

Barry just nodded; he couldn’t open his mouth, if he did he would just scream at how good this was.

“Wanna fuck you.” Len muttered, fingernails raking over Barry’s back. “Wanna fuck you so bad right now.”

Barry whined, nodding again. He got his hands on the bottle of lube again. He needed to get himself ready, stretch and open himself up to fit Len, to take Len inside him, all of Len. Before he could get anything out of the bottle, Len snatched it out of his hand.

“You think I’m gonna pass up this chance?” Len said as he got his fingers wet. “No way in hell.”

Barry just laughed. They shuffled around, awkwardly and quietly as not to disturb the house, until Barry lay on his back. Len gladly lay on top him, lavishing sloppy, wet kisses against his neck. Barry had to bite down on his lips so hard he almost bled when Lens cold index finger pushed into him. Len had to have taken one of those honeypot classes Barry always passed on, because _holy shit, just one finger and Barry was a mess._ Lens finger moved perfectly inside him, crooking and bending in a way that seemed impossible.

“God, yes, Len!” he whined in Lens ear.

When another finger entered him, Barry couldn’t breathe. He clamored after Lens body, one hand still raking over his back while the other begged for hold on Lens hair. Sadly, it was too short to grab onto, and Barry was left just digging into his skin.

“Fuck, Barry,” Len murmured, and groaned at Barry as he slid another finger into him. “-so tight, so fucking tight. Can’t imagine what you’ll feel like on my cock.”

“Len, fuck, just do it.” Barry pleaded, breaths ragged. “Just fuck me. I need it so bad, c’mon.”

“Sure you’re ready?” Len asked with a smirk.

He crooked his fingers, and reveled in the strangled sound Barry made when Len found his sweet spot. Barry nodded frantically. He clawed at Lens skin, pulling Len closer to him. Barry wanted him so close, he wanted Len to be so close to him and inside him and everywhere all at once. Len withdrew his fingers, which made Barry nearly weep. He coated his cock with lube as quickly as he could. He didn’t hesitate to push into Barry. He had to be careful though; Len had to bite his tongue to keep from making any noise, and Barry did the same.

_It was so good. Barry couldn’t comprehend how everything was so amazing. Len fucked into him, breathing into his neck, and Barry couldn’t be happier._

The door swung open. “Barry, Len! We got breakfast on the-“ Joe started, but backed out again as soon as he understood what he had walked in on.

Barry and Len startled at the sudden intrusion, scrambling for the sheets to cover themselves. The door slammed shut, and, _thank God,_ Joe was on the outside.

“Sorry! Sorry!” he called, though, from the other side of the door. “I had no idea that-…well, uh, breakfast is ready so…whenever you’re ready.”

They listened intently to Joe’s steps as he walked away. Neither of them breathed until the sound had disappeared down the stairs. Barry collapsed onto Len with an embarrassed groan.

“I hope you were already out of the closet.” Len said, and it was a completely honest hope.

He doubted that Joe, even though he didn’t know him very well, would have any issue with Barry being gay, or bi for all Len knew. But still. Len would hate to be the one to out Barry if Barry hadn’t done it himself.

But Barry shook his head. “No, no, it’s fine. I was out before I even joined the army.” he huffed. “And I may be nearly thirty but no one wants their parents to walk in on them having sex.”

Len couldn’t help but laugh at that.

“True.” he said. “So…is it too much to hope we’ll finish this?”


	19. Chapter 19

What the fuck was Len doing in this suburbia-hellhole?

The houses were in neat rows, gardens had not a single flower petal out of place and lawns so perfectly trimmed. Mick had a serious urge to set one of the lawns on fire just to see how long it would take before the whole neighborhood was consumed by the flames. A tempting thought. He reached into the pocket of his jacket, fingers wrapping around his lighter.

No. No, that wasn’t why he was there. He’d find some place to burn to the ground after this was over.

Right now, he needed to find which house Len was in.

Mick had spent all night tracking Len and his new companion. From the train station, to the Saints and Sinners Pub, to the Back Room Jazz Bar. They had been brothers for ten years; Mick could track Len wherever he went. It might also have something to do with the chip he had put in Len, but that was details.

Okay, yes, Mick put a tracker in Len; in his hip, when Mick had been patching up an injury there a few years ago. While digging out a bullet, Mick had slipped in a tracker. What? It was how he showed he cared! That way, he could always find Len and drag his dumb ass out of the line of fire!

The tracker wasn’t exactly common knowledge either. Only Mick knew about it, and there was no way in hell he would hand that kind of information over to Queen and his man. Mick would find Len on his own, and he would _join him_. Mick would turn traitor and join Len and the companion.

The Agency could go fuck itself if it thought Mick would ever turn on Len.

*

The whole house rattled when the door was kicked in. Joe, sitting in the living room, was on his feet in a flash. His hand went to his gun, but stopped. The man who had come into the house already had a gun out, and it was pointed right at Joe.

“Who the hell’re you?” the man bit.

“I think I should be askin’ you that, you’re the one who broke into _my_ house.” Joe responded as he raised his hands.

“I’m lookin’ for my brother.” the man said. “Tracked him here. Tell me where he is.”

Joe shrugged. “I don’t know who your brother is, but I can promise you, he is _not_ here.” he said.

Barry was down the stairs in a flash, brandishing his own gun. The intruder turned to look, taking his weapon off of Joe. The cop didn’t hesitate to draw his sidearm.

“Drop your weapon!” Joe ordered.

“Get on your knees!” Barry added. “Hands behind your head!”

The intruder seemed to be cursing to himself, but also realizing he was out-gunned. He raised his hands.

“I’m just lookin’ for my friend, man.” he said as he slowly lowered himself to his knees.

He placed the gun on the floor, sliding it towards Barry’s feet. The agent grabbed it quickly, but…this wasn’t the kind of weapon he had been expecting. Barry had expected something cheap, bought on the street, but this was a high-end piece of armament. This was Agency issued.

“Who are you?” Barry questioned. “State your name, Agent!”

The man scoffed at him. “Don’t get your panties in a bunch, kid.” he said. “I ain’t here to turn ya in, or kill ya. Where’s Lenny?”

This guy was looking for Len? Wait…

“Mick?” Barry said, lowering his gun just slightly.

“Yeah?” the man said. “What’s it to you?”

Len came running down the stairs with Iris close behind him. He came to a halt on the last step, holding his arms out to keep Iris from running out into the line of fire.

“Barry, Joe.” he said. “I see you’ve met my partner Mick.”

The man smiled, waving mockingly at them. “Hey.” he said.

“What the hell are you doing here, Mick?” Len bit at him.

Mick looked utterly scandalized. _“What am I doing?”_ he repeated. “You’re the one who went rogue, you fuckin’ idiot! What? D’you think I wouldn’t come with you?”

“No, that’s not what I-“

“No, you were bein’ your usual, stuck-up self.” Mick said gruffly. “If you’d’ve just fuckin’ told me what the hell was goin’ on, I’d’ve gladly come with ya!”

Len sighed. He ran a hand over his shaved head.

“I was trying to keep you out of it, Mick.” Len said.

Mick scoffed. “Well, I’m in it now and I ain’t goin’ nowhere.” he decided.


	20. Chapter 20

Len had driven them to a neighborhood across town. Mick was in the front seat next to Len and Barry sat in the back, mostly of his own volition.

Mick had broken into Barry’s home and pointed a gun at Joe. Len might trust Mick but Barry sure as hell didn’t. He wasn’t about to let that guy out of his sight any time soon.

The new-comer was a little too antsy for Barry’s taste. He kept fiddling with a lighter, clicking it over and over again. His knee was bouncing too. It didn’t seem to bother Len, but it was definitively getting on Barry’s nerves. They had been partners for a long time; Len had probably gotten used to the constant clicking of the lighter. Barry was on the verge of confiscating the damn thing and tossing it out the window.

Len hadn’t said a word since they had gotten in the car. Now they sat parked on the side of a street, waiting. Barry wasn’t sure what they were waiting for exactly. Len had taken them there but hadn’t moved since. He stared out his window at the house they sat in front of.

Barry wanted to ask Len what was the matter, but it wasn’t his place. He barely knew the man. If anyone was going to ask, it would be Mick, yet he hadn’t said a word either. Then again, Barry had realized what was bothering Len. This was his house, his childhood home. Where the _‘vile and sick thing’_ had lived and breathed, and where Len had ended him.

Of course it would get to Len. Of course it would bother him.

“Len.” Barry said finally.

He couldn’t stay quiet anymore. He…cared about Len, but if they got this over with, they could get out of here; move onto the next clue, or maybe even the treasure at the end of the hunt. 

“I’m sorry, but we need to do this now.” Barry said sternly. “Before anyone catches up with us.”

Len took a deep breath, and climbed out of the car. The two others followed his lead. They had watched the family that lived there now leave; the kids went off to school, parents headed out to work. It was empty.

Mick went around back, cut power to the alarm system in the junction box. Barry picked the lock; he and Len breached from the front, as Mick went in through the back porch door. They weren’t sure how many people occupied the house. If there was anyone left, they would need to be aware of it before things got messy. Len broke off to sweep the second floor, while Mick and Barry crept around the first.

“All clear.” Barry said as he exited the bathroom he had just checked.

“Same here.” Mick responded, meeting Barry in the living room.

“All good upstairs.” Len added as he came down the stairs.

“Good. So, Len.” Barry said, hiding his gun away at the back of his jeans. “Any idea where to look?”

Len was silent for a moment, thinking quickly about the lay-out of the house. “He had an office, back there.” he said, pointing down a short hallway that lead out of the living room. “The bedrooms upstairs maybe. It would have to be somewhere where the family wouldn’t find it.”

“I’ll cover the office.” Barry said and headed down the hallway.

The other two moved upstairs.

Barry entered the office quietly. It was in his nature, beginning in his Ranger days and only strengthened by his training with the CIA. The silence, and the darkness, was how he survived. That was how he worked.

The bookcases were clean; no hidden safes, no little hide-aways cut into any of the books, nothing over, under, or behind the books or cases themselves. The desk was clean as well; nothing in the papers on top of it, nothing interesting in the drawers, and no secret compartments. The picture frames were clean, and the family in the photos looked…sweet. Kind. There was nothing so far. Barry searched the place top to bottom, twice, but found no clues or indicators that Lisa had been there since childhood.

He hurried upstairs. Parents, and two kids, so there would be at least three bedrooms, maybe Mick and Len needed a hand.

“Len.” Barry said as he entered a child’s bedroom. “Anything?”

The walls were covered in a dark blue wallpaper, dotted with stars and moons and little cartoon spaceships. A telescope was set up by the window, glow-in-the-dark stars stuck to the ceiling, drawings of spaceships up on the walls, and books about space filled the small bookcase near the door. Woah, this kid was a space-nut.

Len sat on the end on the bed. He had a…dazed look on his face. This had to be his room, when he was a kid. Barry wondered what the place had looked like back then.

“I…I didn’t find anything.” Len said. “It’s clean.”

Barry walked over to him and sat down as well. Len was quiet. Barry could almost hear the man’s heart pounding. His hands were shaking, where they lay in his lap. Barry wanted to say something. What could he say, though? He had never experienced anything like what Len had. He wouldn’t know where to start. There were no words that Barry could think of that could possibly make Len feel any better.

“I…” Barry attempted. “How are you doing?”

Len inhaled sharply but nodded. “I’m fine.” he said. “It’s fine.”

Barry hesitated for just a second, but then…he put his hand on Lens thigh. He hoped it would work as a calming gesture. He didn’t want Len to feel bad. He didn’t want to see Len this… _tortured._

“You don’t have to lie, Len.” Barry said softly. “You can feel bad. There’s nothing wrong with that.”

Len nodded at that. He lay his hands on Barry’s and squeezed it tightly.

God, Len hated it. He hated this house. He hated this room. He hated all of it. Why would Lisa take him back there? She knew _exactly_ how he felt about it and still she had made him go there. Made him revisit all those horrible, _horrible_ memories. All the fear and the anger was rushing back into his body; he wanted to kill Lewis all over again! This time, he would make it slow. He’d drag it out, inflict all the pain on him that he had on them. He’d break his arms and legs, fucking _pulverize_ his ribs, make him more bruise than man, then finally, _finally_ , when he had realized what ha piece of garbage he was…Len would keep going. He would keep going and he wouldn’t stop. He would take his nineteen years of pure misery and give them right back.

“Found it!” Mick called through the house.

Len was out of his bedroom before Barry could react, but Barry followed as quickly as he could. They met up at the top of the stairs. Mick had another white envelope in his hands, which he passed to Len as soon as he could. No one mentioned it if they saw the tears Len had attempted to wipe away.

“You’re not too bad to come in. You’re not too good to stay out.”

“What the hell does that mean?” Mick huffed, crossing his arms.

Len cleared his throat and wiped his eyes again. “It’s, uh, it’s something the priest said at our moms funeral.” he said. “We need to go to church.”


	21. Chapter 21

Barry wasn’t a particularly religious guy, but there was something about churches that he loved. It seemed like whatever was going on in the world, a church, no matter where on the planet it was, always had a peaceful air about it. Really, it went for any place of worship, he supposed. At times, he would go to a mosque, or a temple, or a church, and just sit there and enjoy the silence. He always felt welcome there.

Not today, though. Today, he had no thoughts of peace in his mind. They were on a mission.

They sat in the back pew, watching the priest who stood up at the altar. He seemed to be setting things in order, rearranging the placements of all the…things? Barry was a fan of churches, he didn’t know everything about them, okay? The priest turned around after a few minutes and noticed his guests.

“Good day too you, my children!” he said as he came down the aisle.

Barry, on the edge of the pew, was first out to meet him, and shook his hand. Mick came next, and Len was last.

“Father Thomas,” Len said as he shook the priests hand. “-I’m sure you don’t remember me, but I need something from you.”

The Father looked confused for a moment, but then smiled again. “Whatever I can help you with, my son.” he said.

“Mick, the picture.” Len ordered.

Mick nodded, and pulled out his phone. He had logged back into the CIA network after leaving Lens old home, and downloaded a picture of Lisa. It was lucky he had done it then too, since he was booted out just moments after he got the photo. Queen and Diggle must have reported him when he didn’t come back to their hotel.

He handed the phone over to Len, who held up the picture of Lisa to the priest. “This is my sister, has she been here recently?” he asked.

Father Thomas got his glasses on, leaning in to get a closer look at the woman’s face. A smile filled his lips, and a look of recognition washed over him.

“Oh, yes! That’s Lisa!” he said. “Then you must be Leonard, no?”

Len nodded quickly, tossing the phone back to Mick. “Yeah.” he said. “Did she leave something for me, Father? It’s really important, you have to understand.”

The Father nodded. “Yes, of course, come with me.” he said, gesturing for them to follow. “She was here some…two weeks ago maybe? She made me swear I wouldn’t tell a soul other than you, no matter what.”

“Thank you, Father.” Len said, he and his companions following the priest closely. “Lisa talked about you a few times. She said you were always there for her.”

The priest hummed as they came through the door to his office. He turned around again, to properly face Len as he spoke.

“Yes, after your…arrest, she was put into foster care, as you know.” he said. “Your mother was a dear friend of mine, and I felt it was my duty to see to it that Lisa knew she was never alone in the world. Not even after everything that happened.” he explained with a solemn look on his face.

Thomas lay his hand on Lens shoulder, looking deep in his eyes. “I would never wish death upon anyone, my son, but…I do believe there is a special place in Hell for people like your father. Of course, it’s not my place to judge, that’s up to the Lord, but if I had a say in it…your father would have been taken many years earlier.” he said.

Len was surprised, but nodded jerkily. “Thanks, Father.” he said. “That means a lot coming from you.”

Mick cleared his throat behind Len, making the Father turn his eye to him instead. “Don’t mean to rush ya, padre, but we’re kinda in a hurry.” he said, but sounded slightly less gruff than usual to Barry’s ears.

“Of course.” the Father said.

He hurried over to the desk that stood over in the corner of the small chamber. It was a modest place, was one would expect from a priest Barry supposed. Thomas took a seat in the desk chair and wheeled into position in front of the desk. They heard a low thud, as if he had kneed the underside of the desk. Then came a short click as a panel on the side not pressed against the wall swung open. The Father got up again and shuffled over to the secret cabinet.

“An heirloom from an earlier minister of this church.” he explained as he took a knee there, and dug into the compartment. “These days, I only use it to hide away the collection money until I can bring it down to the bank.”

He let out a soft noise of achievement once he had apparently found what he was searching for, then got back on his feet and hurried over to meet Len. Thomas held up a black flash drive.

“I don’t know what’s on it.” he said. “Lisa said it was best if I didn’t know. That I’d be safer that way.”

Len nodded as he received it. “Thank you, Father.” he said earnestly. “Really. Thank you. This…this might do some good.”

A smile filled the Fathers face and he patted Lens shoulder. “I’m glad.” he assured. “Now, you should go. I have a service that starts in just a few minutes. I’m assuming you’ll want to avoid the people?”

Len nodded again, and smiled in return. “Yeah.”

“There’s a back exit that leads out to the old graveyard.” Thomas said. “Just follow the hallway and you’ll get there, then there’s a gate at the end of the path. It’ll take you out to the street behind the church.”

“We can’t thank you enough, Father.” Barry said with an appreciative smile. “And if anyone asks-“

Thomas hummed and appeared thoughtful. “Leonard Snart?” he said, his forced neutral look cracking into a smile. “I haven’t seen that boy since he was nineteen.”

The trio laughed lowly to themselves as they jogged out of the office and down the hallway, as instructed.


	22. Chapter 22

This was it. The moment of truth. They had finally found what Lisa had hidden.

Mick was driving. Len and Barry sat in the backseat. Len had Barry’s laptop open in front of him and the flash drive in his hand.

He couldn’t believe it. They actually made it. _He_ made it. It was Lisa’s last wish in life and he was about to make it a reality. He was about to get restitution, get Lisa’s good name back, show the world that she wasn’t what she had been made out to be! Len didn’t think he had ever been this happy before. He could hardly breathe, this was making his head pound and his heart race.

Len looked up at Barry. The kid smiled, nodding slowly, as if urging Len to go on. Len took a deep breath to still his shaking hands, then plugged in the flash drive.

A window popped open, displaying the files on the drive. _Project Star? Patient logs?_ What was this? He got the first file open; a folder, containing a PDF file with the same name and a list of numbered video files. Logs of some sort, maybe? Len opened the PDF. It was some kind of report. The first page had a big CIA crest in the center, and a logo he didn’t recognize just below it. He scrolled down a few pages and skimmed through a couple of the paragraphs in hopes to gain some understanding to what this was all about.

Len read, and read, and read, _and read but this didn’t make sense._

Doctor Hunter Zolomon, PhDs in bio-chemistry, microbiology, molecular science. Okay, so pretty much a genius. He talked about this top secret project, commissioned by the Director of the CIA. It had started as some kind of…advanced medical treatment, something to speed up the healing process, but had evolved into a sort of super soldier serum. The more of this Len read, the crazier it sounded.

Illegally requisitioned prisoners used as test subjects, a black site on US soil, and the seal of approval from the Director himself? This couldn’t possibly be true.

“What’s it say, Lenny?” Mick asked curiously.

“It’s…they’re making soldiers.” Len said, the disbelief evident in his voice.

“Making soldiers?” Barry repeated. “How do you mean?”

Len shrugged. “I don’t know. This Doctor Zolomon created some kinda serum, and he’s testing it on people the Agency picks out of prisons all over the country.” he said.

He backed out of the PDF, and opened up the file named _Patient Logs._ Another list of videos? Len scrolled through the list and there were…an uncountable number. Patients from one through forty-five, a couple of clips for each of the patients. Len picked one at random.

 

_A new window opened up. The video started zoomed in on a man’s face, but he took a step back after a second. He wore a white lab coat, and he was in some sort of lab. There was a gurney behind him, but he obstructed the face of the person laying on it. She was making fearful noises, fighting against the restraints._

_“I am Doctor Hunter Zolomon.” he said with a small smile. “This is log one, for patient forty-one. The patient’s name is Lashawn Baez, and we are about to inject her with the serum. She will, most likely, become unconscious, as is normal, but she should regain consciousness again in just some minutes.”_

_Zolomon turned around and walked out of sight from the camera for a moment. This revealed the woman on the gurney. She was dressed in a white jumpsuit, some new prison uniform, eyes following after the doctor._

_“Please! Please, stop! I don’t wanna do this!” she begged, pulling on the restraints still. “Jus-just let me go a-and I won’t tell anyone! I swear! Please! Let me go!”_

_Zolomon came back into frame, and he had a big injection gun in his hand._

_“It’s alright to be afraid, Miss Baez.” he said, patting her on the arm. “This will be over in just a moment.”_

_Baez screamed when Zolomon placed the gun against her neck, right over her carotid artery. She tried to thrash against him, but he simply grabbed a handful of her hair to keep her in place. When he injected her, she screamed again._

 

God, Len couldn’t take this. He couldn’t listen to this poor girl screaming and begging for her life. Len closed the video down again.

“We have to stop this.” he said sternly. “This needs to end. I don’t care if these people belong in prison, they don’t deserve to be treated like guinea pigs for some psycho scientist!”

Barry nodded beside him. “I agree. We need to get this out to every reporter in the country, the whole world.” he said. “If people know about it, the President himself will have to get involved. They can’t let this keep going.”

“That could take months!” Mick all but shouted. “Did you hear that girl?! She’s in there, wherever the hell it is, and she’s scared outta her mind! This Zolomon freak said she’s number forty-one! There’s forty other people in there, probably just as scared as Baez, or whatever her name was!” he argued. “We need to get them outta there!”

Len took a deep breath. Mick was right, but so was Barry. They needed to help these people, but they needed to get these files and videos out into the world.

“Here’s what we’ll do.” Len said, a plan already forming in his mind.


	23. Chapter 23

They were back at Joe’s house. Barry had called both Iris and the Detective and begged them to meet him back there.

It took some slight convincing, but Len handed the flash drive over to Iris. She had stern orders; if she didn’t hear from them within seventy-two hours, she was to publish the entire condense of said flash drive online, and send it to every reporter she could get a hold of. Even if they didn’t make it out of this, the project would be outed to the world. The Agency wouldn’t be able to hide its wrong doings any longer.

Joe had his part to play in the ‘mission’ too. He gave them the names of a few known black market gun dealers in the city. If they were going to do this, they needed untraceable weapons. It would be easy to do a shake down on some of the dealers and get all the supplies they would need. Joe was opposed to the idea of vigilante justice. Then again, he supposed that the good outweighed the bad in this situation. Some arms dealers would be handled and delivered to the CCPD with a pretty little bow on top, and the weapons went towards a better cause than they would have otherwise.

At first, the Wests were, understandably, hesitant to assist. Len reluctantly showed them the video of Lashawna Baez. This time, they watched until the end. They watched as the poor woman was knocked unconscious by this serum Zolomon injected her with. They watched her wake up just minutes later; she convulsed as if she was having a seizure, and screamed and she bled from her eyes, ears, nose, mouth, the blood just kept coming. It went on for minutes. The serum seemed to be ripping her apart from the inside out, and Zolomon just stood there beside her taking notes as if it was something completely normal!

When Baez finally stopped moving, when she passed out again, the clip ended.

After that, they were glad to help, to do anything they could to free these people from the torture they were enduring.

The agents headed out again. They had guns to repossess.


	24. Chapter 24

The black site was a few miles outside the city, some old research lab that got shut down years ago. Probably just another reason Lisa had lead them back to Central City. She had known Len wouldn’t stand by as these people were tortured.

The team had gotten their hands on a night black car, which made it easier to get close to the facility once the sun had gone down. Still, they parked half a mile out to make their entrance quiet. They suited up; one of their dealers had gotten their hands on some SWAT tactical gear somehow, which just did the mission good, really. Plus, they were all glad they had taken the gear out of criminal hands. No one wanted bank robbers in SWAT uniforms.

“Ready?” Barry asked softly as he got his glasses on.

“Ready.” Len responded while he pulled his gloves on.

“Same here.” Mick added, tightening the straps on his vest a little.

“Good.” Barry said. “I’ll lead the breach an-“

“Wait, why the hell’re you takin’ the lead on this?” Mick asked as gruffly as always.

Barry sighed. “Because as far as I know, I’m the only one here with HRT training.” he said.

Len rolled his eyes until they landed back on Mick. “Just go with it, Mick, okay?” he asked. “It’s half an hour, an hour maybe, and like he said, he’s got HRT training. It’ll be over before you know it.”

Mick glared at Barry, but nodded after a moment, as if surrendering to Lens will.

“ _Like I was saying._ ” Barry said. “I’ll lead the breach. I want a single file. Mick takes the six, watch our backs. If we can, avoid gunfire until we’re inside.” he ordered. He could feel his soldier days creeping back up on him. “We don’t wanna alert them until we’re in the building. I don't think we need to worry about cameras. It’s a black site, no way they’d keep that kind of record on things.”

“Yessir.” Mick chirped mockingly.

Len scoffed, shaking his head to himself. “Could I have a word with you, Barry?” he asked.

“Yeah.” Barry said, nodding quickly. “Sure.”

“Whatever. Gotta take a leak anyway.” Mick said, before heading back down the road a little bit.

Once he was out of earshot, Len stepped a little closer to Barry.

“What d’you wanna talk about?” Barry asked as he closed the trunk of the car as quietly as possible.

“This morning.” Len said, making Barry freeze.

“Oh.” he said almost breathlessly, before clearing his throat. “Look, it was an…emotional night and I get it, you got Mick and I won’t be-“

“Wait.” Len interrupted. “What do you mean I got Mick?”

Barry took a deep breath, shrugging. “Yeah, you’re obviously a thing.” he said. “I mean, he hates me.”

Len scoffed. “Mick hates everyone.” he insisted. “And Mick? He’s not gay! He’s not… _anything_ , I think. He and I…we’re friends. Brothers, more like it. He hates you because I…I like you.”

“You…like me?” Barry repeated. “I mean, you _like_ me?”

Len shrugged, looking out over the fields around the dirt road they stood on. “Think so.” he said. “I’d like to figure it out. When we’re done with this.”

“That sounds…” Barry said lowly. “That sounds nice. I’d like that.”

“ _Jesus Christ!_ ” Mick called at them suddenly, making them look up at him as he came walking back towards them. “If you two idiots’d stop makin’ goo-goo eyes at each other, we could actually get this shit over with!”

The agents all chuckled at that; it was good. They needed a little humor before something like what they were about to do.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Quick note in case you didn't know:  
> HRT stands for Hostage Rescue Team.  
> They are, as the name insinuates, a team of people trained specifically to handle hostage situations. I guess SWAT could also be classified as a sort of HRT, but I'm not really sure.  
> In my mind, Barry got the training as a part of his military past or possibly during his time with the CIA


	25. Chapter 25

The team jogged up the dirt road. Barry was in the lead, Len close behind, and Mick last with eyes in the back of his head. They stayed low.

The facility was half a mile away from where they had parked. It was a big white brick of a building, with barbed wire fences all around and armed guards patrolling. As they came closer, they slid into the ditch on the side of the road to keep out of sight. They moved quickly and quietly, until they were near fifty meters out. Barry looked through the scope of his assault rifle.

“Two at the gate.” he whispered softly into the coms they had also…acquired. “Patrols, two by two. Three minute between passes over the gate, that’s our timeframe.”

“Copy.” his team chorused back.

“Rory, on the left. Snart, take the right.” Barry continued. “Quick and quiet, non-lethal force. These guys are just following orders. I’ll watch your six.”

“Copy.” they responded again.

“Move on my mark.” Barry ordered.

He kept watching through his scope. A pair of the guards headed towards the gate from the east of the compound. They would reach the gate in a few seconds. If they got to them just after they passed the gate, the team would have the most time they could get. They would need all of it to break into the building.

“Go!” he ordered. “Go, go, go!”

They moved forward without hesitation. Len scurried across the road to the ditch on the right side, making for easier access to the guard he had been assigned. The moment the patrol had moved out of earshot, they sprinted up to the sentinels. Mick jumped his, and Len did the same to the other one, while Barry was their look-out. He scanned over the compound as they dragged the sentinels into the ditches.

“Two minutes, fifteen seconds until next pass.” Barry said.

“Copy.” Mick responded. “We got a door, twelve o’clock. Lookd like a card scanner.”

“I got it.” Len said.

They moved forward again, staying low to avoid the floodlights. As they came to the door, Barry and Mick both took a knee with their eyes searching over the compound, while Len went for the scanner. He broke open the front panel with the help of his knife and revealed the wired-up insides. Thankfully, Len was a nosy bastard so he had gotten good at cracking the CIAs own security measures pretty soon after joining up. The scanners were pretty much all the same wherever in the world they had bases, so it was child’s play to hot wire it and get the door open.

Len tapped Barry on the shoulder, signaling for him to get up and follow. As Barry did, he tapped Mick on his shoulder and he followed too.

They moved into the building.


	26. Chapter 26

“Wake up, Mister Allen.”

 

_What? What…what was happening?_

 

“Mister Allen, you need to wake up.”

 

_God, his head was pounding._

 

“Mister Allen!” the voice shouted right into his ear.

Barry jolted awake and his body instinctively wanted to sit up. He couldn’t sit, why couldn’t he sit up? He couldn’t move! What? Why?! What’s happening?

“You don’t even have to try, Mister Allen.” the voice, a man, continued. “Those are titanium reinforced cuffs. Yes, we had to move on from the usual leather ones after we saw the effects of the serum in our later patients.”

Barry’s heart raced, his breathing was short and unsteady. His eyes darted around. Where was he? Who was talking to him? A lab! He was in a lab. He knew this lab, though. He recognized it. Wait… _no! This was the lab from the video! From the video with Lashawn Baez!_ Oh, God, no! They must have been caught. Cornered, then taken as new test subjects to save the Agency the trouble of killing them. Fuck! Where was Len? Mick? Where were they? They had to be there too somewhere!

The voice, the man, came into view as he rounded the table Barry was laid up on.

_Zolomon!_

“You’re gonna pay for this!” Barry shouted at him.

He had to fight back in any way he could. He couldn’t allow himself to go quietly into… _this!_

“You won’t get away with it, you freak!” Barry continued. “You’re a fucking monster, Zolomon!”

The doctor froze. His head fell forward and Barry could hear him take a deep breath, fists clenching at his sides.

“You’re confused, Mister Allen.” Zolomon said sternly as he continued toward the desk where his camera was set up. “You’re confused, and all I want to do is help you. This serum, is going to make you better.”

“Fuck you!” Barry yelled, fighting against the metal cuffs despite the fact that it was doing no good. “Fuck you! Fuck off! I don’t want anything to do with you, you fucking freak! You’re a freak! A monster! You won’t get away with all this!”

Zolomon ignored his shouting, and turned his camera on.

“I am Doctor Hunter Zolomon.” he began, his smile disgustingly audible. “This is log one, for patient fifty-one. The patient’s name is Bartholomew Henry Allen, and we are about to inject him with the serum. He’ll fall unconscious for some minutes, but it is to be expected, of course. Let’s begin, shall we?”

Barry felt just like he was sure Baez had felt when she lay there. His heart pounded faster and faster, as he watched the doctor grab the injection gun.

“Fuck you! Fuck you! Get the fuck away from me, you freak!” Barry screamed, fighting still. “Monster! You’re a fucking monster, Zolomon!”

The gun was pressed against his neck. It was so cold.

 _No, no, no!_ _No! Please, no!_

*

Barry jolted awake again.

He screamed at the top of his lungs, his stomach burned like there was a wildfire inside it. Every cell in his body was on _fire!_ He had no control over himself! Why was he twitching and moving and why couldn’t he control himself? His face was wet, it was the blood, it was pouring down his face and he could taste it in his mouth. His sight was blurred red.

Why was this happening? He was in so much pain and he felt like he was melting.

“It’s okay, Mister Allen.” Zolomon said next to him. “You’ll pass out again in a few moments. Most patients do. Don’t worry.”

Barry screamed as hard as he could! Someone had to help him! Someone needed to get him out of there!

But no one came.


	27. Chapter 27

Len sat on the floor of his cell, some kind of glass box. He was in between two men, who both seemed to have been there for a while going by their unshaven faces. Mick was in another box, across the way. He was pacing back and forth from wall to wall, restlessly.

They had been injected with the serum. Len couldn’t remember much of the process. That freak Zolomon had talked to Len like _he_ was the nutcase. Len had screamed and fought and bled. There was a lot of bleeding, that Len was sure of. His nose had still been dripping when they dragged him into his cell. He had been powerless to stop them; he had lain on the floor, a literal bloody mess, and watched as they had grabbed Mick, who was still knocked out, and taken him away. When they returned him, he was just as much of a mess.

Then they grabbed Barry and the process was repeated again.

Len wanted to go home so badly. He wanted to leave, and just go away to anywhere that wasn’t _this place._ It was exactly like when he was a kid, when his father had been around. All he ever wanted those days was to get out! Get out of that house and go anywhere else. Now…it was the same. He was so afraid. He hated himself for it, but Len was so afraid of what was coming. He had read the report so he knew what would happen. Either the serum worked on him, or it killed him. If it didn’t work, it would eat him up, cell by cell, from the inside.

He didn’t want to die. Ever since Lewis had been around, Len had known he was going to die. Either it would be by his hand, or it would be in juvie, or later in prison, or after that when he went into the CIA. He had known, for so long, that he would die. Len had come to accept it. So he had thought at least. But now, when he was just sitting there waiting to see if his body would eat itself, Len had never been so afraid before. No mission, no dangerous situation, no injuries, had ever scared him this much. Len didn’t want to die. He didn’t want his life to end. He just…he didn’t want to die.

Mick was taking a different approach. Instead of fear, he was going with anger. He was going with his usual rage, stomping around and growling curses under his breath. Len didn’t blame him. He would have loved taking that approach instead; he would have loved to be angry, instead of afraid.

“Mick!” he shouted. “Pacing’s not going to help!”

Mick flew at the wall facing Lens cell in a rage. “Then what the fuck am I supposed to be doin’, Len?!” he shouted. “Tell me what the fuck I am supposed to be doin’ right now! You’re the one with the brilliant fuckin’ plans! So figure somethin’ out!”

Len wished he could. As soon as he could stand up and actually think straight again, he had started working. Searching for any way, _anyway at all,_ to escape.

The cells had no discernible weaknesses to exploit. As far as he could tell, the doors were electromagnetically sealed, a magnet on the door and one in the frame. As soon as the power was turned on, they were impossible to pull apart unless he magically developed the ability to also lift a six-ton truck. The glass was six inches thick; _that_ he could tell from the wide-spread air holes that went across the middle of the walls. Even if it wasn’t bulletproof, which he was guessing it was, it would take a high powered high caliber machine gun to even put a crack in the glass. The walls, floor, ceiling…every ‘joint’ of the glass had been _melted_ together to make a single piece, no cracks or spaces between the panes. Their beds were foam mattresses on the floor with no pillows or covers. Toilets were stainless steel attached to the wall, literally welded into the walls with some sort of chain links that went through holes in the glass to keep it in place. Len had tried to take it apart in search of anything that could help. It was all welded shut. The jumpsuit Len now wore was one piece of fabric sown into shape, and held shut over the chest by Velcro.

There was _literally nothing_ that could facilitate an escape. This prison was escape-proof, impossible as it sounded to Lens own ears. Len had engineered escape plans from hundreds of prisons all over the world; he did It for fun in his nights off, for fucks sake! But this…this one he couldn’t break. He couldn’t figure out its weakness, he couldn’t figure it out like he had all the others.

Every one of Lens skills, every ounce of his intelligence, was useless. He was useless. He was incapable of helping friends when they needed him most. He was just sitting there, thinking about all the ways he was a failure. He hadn’t saved his mom. He hadn’t saved Lisa. He couldn’t eve help Mick or Barry.

What was he good for if he couldn’t even help his friends?


	28. Chapter 28

Mick had finally stopped pacing. Len supposed he had worn himself out, or maybe he had just realized that there was no way out. Either way, he had given up.

Barry was awake again. He had pounded against the glass and screamed to high hell for minutes before Len could make him listen. Before Len could tell him it was no use. He was laying on his mattress, staring up at the ceiling.

“Any idea when this serum is supposed to take effect?” he asked.

Len wasn’t sure how long they had been quiet; it could have been minutes, it could have been hours. Honestly, he had already lost count.

“Don’t know.” Len responded. “But I’m guessing since none of us are dead yet, we’ll be feeling it soon.”

He had tried talking to the other ‘ _patients’_ , get some information out of them. They wouldn’t listen. Or no, it was like they couldn’t hear him. They had been locked up for so long that they had shut down. They were catatonic. Most of them didn’t move from their beds. The few that did, just stood around, staring into space. It was frightening sight. What if he, Mick, and Barry were there long enough to become like them? They were nearly there already. Mick hadn’t moved from where he stood, leaning against the glass, in a while. Len had sat in the exact same spot for hours now, it felt like. He would have thought Barry was asleep if he couldn’t see that his eyes were still open.

Len hissed as a particularly sharp stab of pain shot through his head. It had been hurting for a while now. At first it was just a dull throbbing, but it had now been accompanied by these stabs that came every few seconds. His ears were ringing too. Why were they doing that?

It was… _it was getting louder!_

The high pitched ringing seemed to eclipse his entire mind, _he couldn’t think_. He stumbled to his feet. He almost fell face first into the glass wall in front of him, but managed to catch himself with his hands against the pane instead.

“Mick!” he shouted, hoping he was louder than the ringing. “Mick! Barry!”

They were at the glass in a moment, getting as close to him as they could.

“Lenny!” Mick shouted back.

“Len!” Barry screamed. “Len! What’s happening, Len?”

The ringing wouldn’t stop! It just kept going and going, getting louder and louder. Len covered his ears as it that would keep the sound out. It bounced around in his head and he screamed as hard as he could. If he could just drown it out, maybe it would stop! His eyes were shut to tightly, his hands pressed so hard over his ears. He could feel the blood seeping out from between his fingers, practically pouring from his ears.

Mick and Barry could only watch on in horror as Len collapsed to the floor; he was silent, unmoving, for a moment. Then his body began to convulse. It was just like the video of Baez.

A team of guards came running down the aisle between the rows of cells, with Zolomon in the lead. They skid to a stop in front of Lens cell. One of the guards had a video camera in hand and he was filming Len, while Zolomon scribbled down his notes.

“Log two, patient forty-nine!” Zolomon said for the camera. “The patient has entered the transformative state circa six hours after injection. Symptoms include convulsing, bleeding from the ears and…the nose as well, it looks like.”

 _“Hey!”_ Mick shouted, banging his fists against the glass. “Hey, Zolomon!”

“Ignore that.” Zolomon said, doing just that. “Patient fifty is being his usual rowdy self. Guard, sedate him.”

One of the guards drew his weapon and headed for Micks cell. Mick himself backed away quickly. The guard stuck the muzzle of his gun through one of the holes in the glass, and fired three rounds. Barry could, again, only watch as Mick was hit in the chest. He thanked God, for Micks sake, that they were only tranquilizer darts. Mick collapsed moments after being hit, while Zolomon was still fully focused on his ‘ _patient’_. Barry wanted to stop him, he wanted to help Len and Mick and everyone else in there with them! But he didn’t dare say a word. If he opened his mouth, they would just tranquilize him too.

So he watched. Barry was quiet and watched as they watched Len.

_God, Barry could hardly focus! This ringing in his ears was driving him nuts!_


	29. Chapter 29

Barry was awake and on his feet in less than a second.

It was as if he had grabbed a live wire and been injected with a gallon of adrenaline at the same time. His whole body was crackling with electricity. His heart was in over-drive, beating a million miles per second it felt like. He could feel his cells multiplying, the hairs on his head growing, his lungs inflating and deflating with every breath. He had never felt so… _alive!_ What was happening? What was this? How was this happening? Barry’s eyes flit around in search of any explanation.

A cell. A new cell. A round cell, made of glass from top to bottom. There were two more, exactly the same, with Mick and Len in either. They looked about as hopped up as Barry felt. They were wearing strange clothes; black uniforms, skin-tight, looked almost like scuba suits. Barry looked down, he was wearing one too. What happened? Why were they in these clothes?

Zolomon walked into the…warehouse. The whole place was blacked out except for the spotlights focused on the three cells. The doctor walked into the center of the triangle formed by them.

“Log three, patients forty-nine to fifty-one.” Zolomon said after pulling his camera out of his pocket and beginning another video. “This is remarkable! In under a day, these three have done what took the others weeks! They have already come at least halfway through the transformative cycle. We should start to see signs of their gifts soon, which is why we were forced to move them into isolation. I am…I’m in awe.” he said, and he looked it, as he watched his _patients_ squirm in their glass jars.

He panned the camera around, stopping for some moments on each of the cells.

“This is an incredible leap forward for this project. I think it’s the latest generation of the serum. I was trying to cut down the cycle time from months to weeks, but this is _unprecedented!”_ the doctor continued. “I don’t know if it has to do with the subjects themselves, maybe they’re more susceptible than the others, or the serum. I’ll have to study the samples I took before the injection and compare to the previous patients. Perhaps, there is something in the genes of these the patients that could lead me to a solution. Some way to speed up the cycle for others too.”

Barry hated him.

Zolomon kept talking and talking about them like they weren’t even there, or like they were just a gang of lab rats.

This was unreal. _Transformation?_ What was going to happen to them? Barry was terrified. He knew the others were too, because who wouldn’t be? Zolomon was insane. God only knew what else he would do to them. Barry had been trained to withstand torture, and he had done so quite successfully on several occasions, but this serum…Barry couldn’t guess in a million years how it would affect them. The injection had been painful enough on its own, with his body feeling like it was burning from the inside out. Then the ringing in his ears and the seizure had been piled on top of it only hours later. What else would it do to him? To them all? There was still no guarantee for survival. All they knew was that they weren’t dead _yet_. That could change any minute. For all Barry knew, they could all drop dead at any second without the slightest warning.

Zolomon approached Barry’s cell and the monitor that no doubt controlled it. The doctor fiddled with it for some moments before his phone rang.

“Zolomon.” he answered, and a look of surprise filled his face. “Director, I wasn’t expecting your call. No, we had no trouble handling them. We clocked them as soon as they entered the compound. They knocked out the guards at the gate so we couldn’t sedate them until they were in the building, but other than that, everything went as you thought it would.”

They had seen them coming. _Of course they had!_ How could Barry be so stupid as to think they wouldn’t?

“Yes, I injected all three of them. Their progress is astonishing.” Zolomon continued, answering some question Barry hadn’t heard. “I can send you my logs on them as soon as I get back to my desk. I think you will be very pleased, Director Wells. The Snarts?”

_Snarts?_

Plural? There was more than one there in the facility?

All three of the agents were at the glass in the blink of an eye. _Lisa._ It had to be. They had to believe it was.

Zolomon hummed as he moved over to Lens cell. “Leonard Snart is, as I said, making brilliant progress.” he said with a smile, looking up at the patient. “You’ll see in the logs. And Lisa?”

_Lisa! It was her! She was here! She was alive! Oh, God, Len couldn’t believe it, he couldn’t breathe because Lisa was right there with him, somewhere in the compound!_

“She’s different, both from her brother and all the others. Her progress is not quite as fast as her brothers, yet faster than the rest. I am entertaining the hypotheses that it may have something to do with genes and susceptibility. I’ll be looking into it.” Zolomon said. “Yes, I’ll head to my desk right away and send you those logs, sir.”

He ended the call and dropped his phone into his pocket, all without taking his eyes off of Len. It was as if he wanted to rub it in his face.

“Where is she?!” Len shouted at him, slamming his hands against the glass. “Tell me where my sister is! Give me my sister back!”

Zolomon’s smile widened. All three of them were screaming their lungs out at him as he walked out.


	30. Chapter 30

It was freezing cold in Lens cell. He had always preferred cold temperatures, they were easier to handle, but this was a little too much. His breathing was quick and unstable, teeth clattering; the shivering was starting to taper off though, which was a bad sign. It meant the hypothermia was getting worse. Len sat huddled up against the glass, as close to his friends as he would probably ever be again, and he was breathing into his hands. If he could heat the blood travelling through them, the heat would start to spread to the rest of his body. It was so cold his extremities were starting to go numb; his feet felt like bricks, and moving his fingers too much hurt like hell.

Mick was having the opposite problem; the heat was unbearable. He was drowning in his own sweat. He had been at least. The sweating was starting to wear off, the heat stroke was worsening. Mick felt…weak. Worn out. He wanted to throw up, and pass out, the world was spinning, and his heart was beating fast enough that you would think he had just ran a marathon! Nothing seemed to make sense. It was all a jumbled mess. He had stripped out of his black uniform, nudity be damned, and lay spread-eagle on the glass. It was cool against his skin, and he felt better for a while because of it.

Barry’s issue was unlike theirs. In fact, it was of a completely different sort. While they were drained of all energy, just waiting for death to come, Barry was... _keyed up_. Like he had snorted ten kilos of cocaine, drank sixty gallons of high octane coffee, and been hit by lightning. There was so much energy inside him! Barry’s whole body was shaking with it. His heart was bouncing all around his body and it felt like it was going to jump out of his mouth! Barry could run a marathon! _Ten marathons!_ He would do anything to just get some of this _electricity_ out of his veins.

“You need to stay awake, guys!” Barry shouted at them, bouncing on his toes and running his hands through his hair. “C’mon! Can’t fall asleep!”

Micks forehead was pressed against the floor of his cell, breaths making the glass fog up. “I can’t…I can’t, man.” he panted. “’M tired. So warm…I n-…I need water.”

“S-S-Same!” Len said, voice breaking as his body shivered. “’S r-r-really h-hard st-stayin’ awake in this c-cold!”

Len knocked his head against the glass a few times. It rattled his entire body and made his head pound even harder, but the sting of pain jolted him awake again.

 _God_ , this was so messed up! Lisa was _alive_ , but Mick and Len were both slowly dying in their cells. Barry was unable to help them, despite being no more than ten feet away from them. _He hated this!_ He wanted to help them so badly, to just wrap Len in a blanket to warm him up and get Mick in a cold shower to cool him off! The electricity was filling the air with sparks. Every hair on his body stood on end. He wanted to jump out of _his_ _fucking skin!_

Barry was helpless. Powerless. Useless. There was nothing he could do and he hated it beyond words.

*

Mick was pacing his cell, and Barry was a little grateful he had put his pants back on before doing so. Barry watched him and he was worried. Mick looked worse than ever before. His skin was flushed red, his breathing ragged, he had trouble keeping his eyes open and staying on his feet seemed even harder. He was staggering around in an attempt to stay awake. Like Barry had said, he couldn’t fall asleep now. If he did, he might not wake up.

“How’re you doin’, Mick?” Barry asked, shaking with all the excess energy rushing through him.

The man nodded. “Good…’M good.” he responded groggily.

“Just stay with me, okay? Just keep your eyes open for me.” Barry said, knocking on the glass again. “Len? You awake?”

He saw Len nod weakly. Len was almost blue in the skin he was so cold. He looked close to death. Barry could swear he saw flakes of frost growing on his skin. _Goddammit!_ Barry just wanted to get them out of there! He didn’t want to watch them suffer! He was restless as hell and this inability to help was just making it worse!

“Ba-Barry!” Len shouted.

It was a short yell. Len looked as if he was putting the last of his energy into speaking.

“L-Lisa…t-t-tell her I-I-I-“ he stammered, breaths coming out as fog.

“No, _I_ won’t tell her!” Barry yelled back. “ _You’ll_ tell her! You’re gonna see her again, Len! Just stay awake! Len! C’mon! Think about Lisa, okay?! She’s here, and you’ll see her soon! Len!”

Len looked at Barry as best he could. His blinks were becoming slower and longer, each one taking more and more effort. It was harder and harder for him to keep his eyes open. Barry screamed at him! He banged on the glass, kicking and punching it with no regard for the pain. If he made more noise, Len wouldn’t fall asleep! He had to keep him awake!

It was too late. Barry watched Len blink, and blink, and…he didn’t open his eyes again. He wasn’t moving, he wasn’t even shivering anymore.

“No!” Barry screamed. “No! Len! Len, wake up! Wake up, Len!”

“Len?” Mick groaned.

Barry’s eyes darted over to him instead. Barry had to focus. Len was gone and there was nothing he could do to save him. He had to keep Mick alive. _He had to!_

“Mick! Stay with me!” Barry begged. “Just keep breathing, okay?! Just keep- Mick!”

Mick collapsed. He hit the floor. The noise of his head slamming into the glass echoed around in his cage. Barry stared at him; he watched for the slightest movement, anything that would show that Mick was still alive. He waited.

Nothing.

There was no rise and fall of Micks chest, no ragged breaths. He…he was gone. They were…they were gone. Both of them. In just a minute, they had both just faded away.

Fuck… _fuck!_

This was so messed up! _Fuck!_ They were fucking dead! _They were dead!_ Right there in front of him, dead and never coming back, never waking up again! Barry couldn’t breathe, the air wouldn’t come into his lungs.

He had seen death, don’t doubt it. He had watched his friends, people he loved like family, die right in front of him before. That’s what you did as a soldier, watched friends die and fought on still, but this…? This was worse. This was a hundred, _a thousand_ times worse! They were right _there_ and Barry couldn’t fight back; he couldn’t fight Zolomon from behind a foot of glass and he couldn’t close Micks eyes and he couldn’t even take their bodies to safety.

Mick looked as if he was sleeping; his face was softened, no frown or scowl wrinkling his brow and misshaping his mouth. The only thing breaking the illusion was his eyes; they were wide open, staring up at the ceiling. He looked so frightened, and Barry didn’t blame him.

Len looked peaceful. The ice was clinging to him, wrapping around him almost like a blanket. Barry’s heart _ached_ for him because Len would never see his sister again. He would never see her smile and laugh or hug her again, even though she was in there somewhere too. She was alive and so close, and Len had fallen just short of the finish line.

Before he knew it, Barry was bawling. He was crying and screaming and beating his hands raw against the glass.

_Everything hurt! Everything hurt so damn much! His whole body screamed with this unrelenting pain! Why? Why? Why? Why?! Why was this happening?! Why were they torturing him like this?! Why anything and everything?!_

Barry didn’t understand! He just didn’t understand!


	31. Chapter 31

Barry was running. He ran along the walls of his cell, as fast as he could. This energy was dangerous. He could feel his heart struggling to keep up with the rhythm his body demanded of it. He had to wear himself out. He needed to get rid of the excess. And if he was running, he couldn’t look at them. If he just moved fast enough they would become a blur.

He wouldn’t see the frost growing in Lens cell. How it was engulfing his body little by little.

He wouldn’t see the steam staining the glass in Micks cell, the heat seemingly boiling his body.

Electricity crackled through the air. It stuck Barry like lightning. He was flung forward and hit the glass with enough force to send a spider web of cracks through it. Barry bounced back from the wall, thrown to the floor like a ragdoll. Miraculously, he was alive. And even more so, he was still awake. His head fell as if it had been ran over by a steam roller a few times, but he was awake nonetheless. It was impossible. _He should be dead!_ Or severely injured, at least. That glass had to be the same kind as in the other cells, and just as thick. How could he possibly have damaged it?

It didn’t matter! It was weakened now! If he could, somehow, break through it…he could contact someone. He could call Iris! Tell her to call in the cavalry! Barry had to do something, he had to break through that damn glass. He got on his feet again. He pressed his back to the glass across from the cracks. Barry took a deep breath. He sprinted at the glass and threw himself at it; he curled into a little ball, hitting it with his side.

The cracks widened! They grew bigger! By less than an inch, yes, but it was enough. It was working! _It was working and the glass was breaking!_ Barry ignored the pain, he would have plenty of time for pain later. He hurried back to his starting position, and did it again.

Ten, twenty, _thirty times or more,_ Barry threw himself at the glass with all he had. Every little bit of strength in his body, all the energy pumping through his veins, _the anger and the hate_ , all of it fueled him. Barry had his eyes set on the cracks. He was almost there now. He had to be. He had to be getting close. There couldn’t be more strength left in the glass. A few more times and he would be through it.

He pushed off from the wall, running at the glass.

Time slowed all around him.

Lightning flashed.

His heart seemed to explode in his chest.

_What was this?_

All the power and the energy that he had felt, all the helplessness and hopelessness, burned like fire in his gut. It was the fuel, he was the engine, and he was being kicked into _tenth gear!_ A cry, a scream, of all those things, fear and anger and grief, broke out from inside him as he raised his fist.

The glass shattered, exploding out as Barry broke through it.

He sailed through the air in a hail of shards, sparks flying around him. He hit the concrete running, and he didn’t stop. The sparks, they…they weren’t just _around_ him. Barry could feel them under his skin, in his flesh, pumping through his veins. His entire being was electrified. How was this possible? How had he broken through the glass? What was happening to him? No. _No, no, no!_ Barry couldn’t think like that now. Not yet, he had more to do. All those thoughts, he could think them later. All that fear, he could feel it later.

Barry skid to a stop at the monitor that sat on a steel pedestal in front of his cell. There were cameras inside the cell, feeds up on the screen. Obviously no one was watching them, otherwise Barry would be up to his neck in guards by then. They probably thought their cells were inescapable. They were probably right, if Barry was to be honest. He wasn’t even sure this wasn’t some elaborate dream or delusion. But the cameras had to be transmitting to somewhere. A server, a data bank, _somewhere._ There were no obvious wires so it had to be a wireless transmission. If he could hijack the signal, he might be able to get a message out. Barry thanked God for all those lessons in ‘computer manipulation’, as the tech called it, Cisco had basically forced onto him.

He was halfway home when he heard a…a noise.

A soft groan behind him.

Barry’s heart sped up, which had to be impossible because it was already going a billion beats per minute, as he whipped around.

_Mick!_

Mick was moving! He was fucking moving! His body moved just the slightest, a slow rise and fall of his chest to show that he was _alive._ Barry ran over to Micks cell and started banging on the glass, it felt like that was the only thing he had been doing for years, but goddammit, he wasn’t going to let Mick fall asleep again! He had already watched the man die once, and he wasn’t about to do it again.

“Mick! Mick, stay awake!” Barry begged at the man. “Just stay awake! Hold on, I’ll get you out of there! Stay with me, Mick!”

Barry moved over to Micks monitor. There had to be a way to get the cell open. He just had to find it. Mick was making more and more noise, his groans becoming louder. He sounded like he was in so much pain. Barry had to get him out. Mick was alive and Barry couldn’t leave him there.

_“No!”_

Barry’s eyes darted up from the monitor, landing on Mick. The man was on his hands and knees. There was…the steam, it was coming from him! It was rising from his skin like smoke from a pyre.

“No!” Mick shouted again. “Don’t open it! Don’t!”

“Mick! I can get you out!” Barry said, ignoring his pleas and refocusing back on the monitor. “Just hold on, I’ll get it open!”

He nearly jumped out of his skin when a boom echoed through the warehouse, as Mick threw himself against the glass. The look on his face was unbridled rage.

“No!”

Barry was so shocked he just _stared_ as Mick stumbled back again. It was as if something was brewing inside him, something was growing and preparing to burst out of him. Barry wasn’t all wrong.

In less than a second, the air inside the cell ignited.

Like a match had been struck and dropped into a tank of gas, the fire grew out of Micks skin. It engulfed him. It wrapped around him and exploded outwards, consuming all that was in its path. Luckily, there was nothing but air, but that also meant there was nothing to slow the fire down, nothing to catch the blast. The shockwave hit the glass with more power than Barry could have hoped to achieve. All of it, the single pane shaped to lock Mick in, cracked under the force and the heat.

Then just as quick as it had started, the fire went out.

Barry didn’t know what to think. He expected, as awful as it sounded, to see only the charred remains of Mick. Instead, Mick stood in the center of his cell, looking healthier than ever. His skin was no longer flushed red, he wasn’t dripping with sweat. He looked fit and ready for battle. Barry had to force himself to look back down at the monitor. He had been so close to opening the cell before Micks…outburst, and he didn’t really want to think about what could have happened if it had been open when _that_ happened.

He pushed the last keys and watched the cell open. A loud clang came from the cage, the locks being undone, before the walls were raised, leaving the floor as only a platform above the ground. Mick was quick to get out; he slithered out under the wall as soon as there was enough room to fit his body through.

Without even thinking, the two of them wrapped their arms around each other. Barry didn’t care about why, but he knew the reason. They had both been terrified, scared for their lives no matter how little they wanted to admit it. Now, they were both just so incredibly grateful to be alive; so grateful that they just needed to express it, despite how much they may actually dislike one another.

“Are you two done?”

Again, Barry was close to jumping out of his skin. It seemed Mick was as well, going by how he too was jolted. They were quick to put a few feet of space between them as they turned to look where the voice had come from.

_Len was alive! He was on his feet, hands against the glass and a smile on his face._

Barry was at his monitor in the blink of an eye. He tapped the screen in the order he had figured out on Micks, and the locks clanged. The air seemed to hiss as the cell walls were raised, a cold wind washing over the already free. Just as they had been, Len was eager to get out. He easily wormed his way out from under the walls, dropping to the floor as the sound of ice cracking filled the air. His body was still covered in frost almost from head to toe, but it was beginning to fall away. The frost fell like snowflakes from his skin.

Mick and Barry all but threw themselves over him, hugging him tightly. Barry could only touch him for a moment though. Lens skin was cold as ice! Barry felt like he had been thrown into the arctic ocean, the cold chilling him right to the bone. Mick seemed to last a little longer, yet not by much. When their skin began to sizzle, they had to push each other away.

Len could hardly breath when he staggered back. “Felt like I was melting.” Len said, as the frost melted off of him and poured onto the floor.

Mick nodded along. “Felt like you were suckin’ the life outta me.” he said with a hand over his heart, as if needing to feel his heart beat to be sure he was still alive.

“Fire,” Barry said, looking at Mick then turned his eyes to Len. “-and ice. Not a great mix, I guess.”

“We can think about that later.” Len said determinately. “We need to get out of here.”

Barry nodded quickly as he stepped over to his own monitor again. “Yeah, I was trying to hijack the signal from this terminal.” he said, jumping back into the work he had almost finished. “If we can get a message out there, someone will come for us. I was thinking DHS maybe. FBI, NSA, anything but the CIA. Wells is in on this. We can’t even guess who else knows.”

“Caitlin Snow.” Mick said flatly. “She’s the Assistant Director, but she was a doctor before she joined the Agency. Ain’t no way in hell she’s in on this.”

“How do you know?” Barry asked. “For sure. If we contact her and she’s in on it, we’re screwed.”

Mick shook his head. “No. I know her.” he insisted. “Trust me, she’d never agree to somethin’ like this. She’s too good for it.”

Barry was…uncertain. He had met Snow; she was a nice woman, but Barry didn’t trust her. Honestly, he didn’t trust anyone in the Agency anymore.

“Mick, how sure are you?” Len asked sternly.

He loved and trusted Mick above anyone else, but this…they couldn’t gamble on this. This was too big. If Mick was wrong, the odds were that Wells and Zolomon would just put them down.

“She’s a good woman.” Mick said. “She’s a doctor. If she had any idea ‘bout this project, it’d get tanked ‘fore it got off the ground.”

“Fine.” Len conceded.

If Mick trusted her, Len trusted her too. Barry stepped aside and let Mick write the message. Snow would probably be more inclined to believe it if it came from someone she knew. He typed out a short message, but was sure to include all the details they had. Before he pressed send, they all said a silent prayer to themselves. Mick hoped Caitlin was still the woman he had known.

*

They got a response only a minute or two after the message was sent.

**[FBI/DHS OM]**

**[ETA 30M]**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'M SORRY FOR MAKING YOU THINK MICK AND LEN WERE DEAD I'M SO SORRY IT HURT ME TOO I LEGIT CRIED A LITTLE WHEN I WAS WRITING IT  
> Anyway...I guess my thought about it was that they kinda went into the same kinda coma that Barry did on the show, except it didn't last as long of course. I also feel like that because of how the serum affected Barry (speeding up his heart-rate, his sensory perception, and all that) a coma wouldn't make sense for him. The idea would be that the serum affects each subject differently as it changed them all in vastly different ways, and would need to take different types of action to make that transformation possible.  
> Tell me what you think! <3
> 
> (Also a quick note in case you aren't aware: the FBI I'm pretty sure you can all guess, but still, it is of course the Federal Bureau of Investigation. The DHS is the Department of Homeland Security, which handles any threat to the national security of the USA. ETA is an commonly used acronym which stands for Estimated Time of Arrival. OM is another acronym, which the military frequently uses. It stands for On the Move or On Mission, but over the radios they usually say Oscar Mike which is from the NATO phonetic alphabet since just saying the letters makes it really easy to mishear or mistake one letter for another. <3 )


	32. Chapter 32

Thirty minutes until rescue.

They just had to stay alive for thirty more minutes.

Snow had summoned up the full forces of the FBI, the DHS, and had probably rounded up every pair of boots from the army base outside the city to come to their aid. She was no doubt on her way as well. She would succeed Wells as Director; with his involvement in this project she had probably already had him detained and taken up the mantle as Interim Director, until things were sorted out in a court.

“We should find somewhere to hide.” Barry said. “Back up will be here soon. We can wait for them.”

“Are you crazy?” Mick bit. “We can’t just sit here when all those people’re still locked up!”

Barry exhaled heavily. “It’s a shitty situation, I know. But we don’t know what the hell Zolomon’s done to us. We shouldn’t risk it.” he argued.

“Barry, look at us!” Len said, gesturing around the circle. “We’re fine!”

“ _I watched you die!_ The both of you!” Barry said. “I don’t care what you say, you are _not fine!_ ”

Well. They couldn’t really argue with that.

They both remembered dying, vividly so. Len remembered how the cold seemed to eat up his body from the inside. How it devoured him, cell by cell, until there was nothing left but ice and frost. Mick remembered how the heat seemed to get sucked into his body, only to pool in his gut and burn him from inside out. The fire and just burned and burned, and left nothing behind. They couldn’t imagine how it had been for Barry, to watch them crawl into the arms of death. It must have been horrible. They had died right in front of him, but he had been unable to help, then he had been left to stare at their corpses.

Though they were both ready to give in to Barry’s orders on this one, they weren’t given the choice.

The spotlights in the ceiling of the warehouse were lit, the whole place covered in the clinical white light they provided. An army of guards in black uniforms, armed to the teeth, began to flow in. They were so many that they could hardly be counted, and they walked with hate in their eyes. As if they had come to despise the people, the things, they guarded. These men…they were not from the Agency, that the trio could see clear as day. It was in the way they carried themselves, how they walked, how they held their rifles. They were private military contractors. They would have no problem killing anyone that walked in front of their guns.

_Electricity sparked. Barry felt like he had been hit with a defibrillator on full power then tossed into a microwave for an hour. What the fuck was happening to him?_

_Time froze._

_Barry’s heart slowed to a somewhat normal pace, and his breathing did too._

_No one was moving._

_On either of his sides, Len and Mick stood unmoving, frozen just like time. They were both staring at the soldiers, unaware of time having come to a standstill._

This was Barry’s chance! He didn’t understand what the hell was happening, but he knew he could take advantage of it. This was his opportunity to take out the entire army without them getting a shot off. He couldn’t, and wouldn’t for the life of him, waste this chance.

Barry sprinted at the army, which had come to a complete stop in the middle of taking up positions. They were lined up in tiers; the first line of soldiers was on their knees, weapons up. The second line stood just behind the first, they too readying to fire. The rest of them had not yet formed a third tier, but Barry expected they would if time started moving again. He had to get rid of them all before then.

He snatched the rifle out of the hands of the closest soldier. Then, Barry simply hit him over the head with the butt of the rifle and continued down the line. He would avoid killing them as best he could. Not out of sympathy, or empathy, or even basic human decency, but for the sole reason that they too would stand trial. They had been complicit in the wrongful imprisonment of over fifty people, and in the deaths of however many more prisoners that had not survived. At the very least, they would all spend the rest of their lives behind bars.

If it weren’t for the gravity of the situation, Barry would have laughed at the sight. All the soldiers had pained looks on their faces, flinching away from the strikes to the head. They were still moving, just…very, very slowly. So time wasn’t at a complete halt, but incredibly slowed? Good to know, Barry told himself as he came to a stop by the door out of the warehouse. The moment he physically stopped moving, time snapped back into regular speed.

The soldiers collapsed onto the floor, falling into piles of unconscious bodies. Mick and Len stood exactly where they had before time stopped, but their faces were covered in shock and confusion. They stared at the soldiers for a moment before lifting their eyes to look at Barry instead.

“How did you do that?” Len asked almost breathlessly.

“I…I’m not sure.” Barry admitted.

He hadn’t really _done_ anything. It just _happened._ One second everything had been normal, the next everything had stopped around him.

“I guess Flash is an apt name.” Len said.

Barry was… _utterly confused._

“I’m not sure I know what that’s supposed to mean.” he admitted again.

“You didn’t see that?” Mick asked as he and Len maneuvered across the field of bodies. “Feel it?”

“Feel what?” Barry asked.

What the hell were they on about? See what? _Feel what?_ He hadn’t felt anything! He had felt exactly like he had since he woke up in that damn jar.

“You were over there,” Mick said, pointing to where Barry had stood some moments. “-then you were here. You were movin’ so fast you were like a… _a blur_.”

“And you were covered in lightning.” Len added. “You really didn’t feel it?”

Barry shook his head. He hadn’t felt a thing! He didn’t understand what the hell they were on about. It didn’t make sense!

Well…

No, that wasn’t true. Maybe it did make sense. Maybe…time hadn’t slowed at all. Time had gone on like normal and…and he had moved so fast that to their eyes, he had only been a blur. It was the logical conclusion, he supposed, but that didn’t exactly mean it made sense. None of it made sense! Mick had died then come back and _exploded into a ball of fire,_ Len had died then come back as some kind of _walking icicle_ , and Barry was _fast as lightning?_ What part of that made any sense at all?!

Barry wanted to think about it; he wanted to sit down and have someone explain to him _exactly_ what had happened to them! But there was no time. In thirty minutes, the cavalry would swarm this place. They had to do something about these soldiers-for-hire. It would be a total massacre if they didn’t. Who knew how many would die? Or how many of the dead would be prisoners who just got caught in the crossfire?

“C’mon! We gotta get going!” Barry said.

Len and Mick grabbed the rifles off of the closest soldiers, and they headed out.


	33. Chapter 33

The warehouse was an off-shoot from the main building, used for storage in the days when the lab was still in function. The corridors were wide and uncomplicated. They were built for easy transport of supplies to and from the lab. As useful as it may have been back then it was absolute shit for the escapees. There was little to no cover, and the sightlines were wide open. Basically the worst possible place to take fire. Thankfully, the force that Barry had taken out had been on its own. They managed to speed through the corridor before they were rundown.

It wasn’t until they got through the doors at the end of the hall that they met another mass of soldiers. The doors lead right into the holding area where all the other prisoners were; glass boxes sitting wall to wall _to wall_ with hopeless-looking victims stuffed into them. Wait, these were all men! Where was Lisa? And Baez? And any other women that Zolomon might have used for his experiments? Maybe there was a different section, maybe they kept the men and women separate for some reason. Now was not the time to think about that, though. The soldiers were flooding towards them, running down the long aisle.

They ran into cover behind the last cell. The glass caught the bullets, ricocheting them all around the place. The men in the cells didn’t even seem to notice what was going on. Mick and Len leaned out of cover whenever they could, firing back at the soldiers. They just had to wear them out and wait for back-up to get there. _Fuck!_ Barry counted the soldiers as best he could but more seemed to appear out of thin air every time he blinked.

He had been in this situation before, back when he was a soldier. Pinned down, surrounded, out-manned and out-gunned. It didn’t end well then, and it probably wouldn’t now either. Barry almost wanted to close his eyes and accept his fate.

But he couldn’t. He couldn’t back then, and he couldn’t now. There was too much riding on this, too many lives depending on them. Barry closed his eyes anyway. He took a deep breath. If he could make time slow again, he could knock out all the soldiers in the blink of an eye. If he could just make it happen again!

_Why wouldn’t time just do as he said?!_

Fuck it! Barry obviously had no control of his new powers, or whatever he was supposed to call them. Forget them! He had years of training, and a few days in a glass jar didn’t change that. Barry took a deep breath. Mick was leaning out of cover, the recoil of his rifle slamming back into his shoulder. There was fire in his eyes, almost literally. The hate was burning inside him. As the other soldiers were forced to take cover from Micks bullets, Barry sprinted across the broad aisle to the other row of cells. He slid into cover there, but didn’t hesitate to start firing as well.

Len stood with his back pressed against the cell, just beside Mick. Fuck. _Fuck, fuck, fuck._ Lisa was there somewhere. She had to be. If Zolomon had lied, Len would end him before back-up even got there. As if the hate became a physical thing, ice spread through Lens body. The touch of cold began in his head, behind his eyes, but flowed like blood in his veins. In an instant his entire being felt as cold as the arctic. Steam seemed to rise out of him, the heat of the world reacting to his icy skin. There was…a power inside him. This sense of might that he had never felt before, that filled his mind. There was no hesitation inside him when he dropped his weapon; it was useless now anyway, the metal had become brittle under Lens cold touch. He stepped out of cover, the floor patched with frost under his feet. The gunfire stopped. It was as if the soldiers were too confused to fight him. The ice inside grew _beyond_ Lens body. It reached over the concrete, stretching out like roots from a tree. The icy tendrils snaked around the legs of the soldiers, ensnaring their bodies and dragging them to the floor. Mick and Barry both watched with wide eyes as Len simply stood there, a focused look on his face.

A handful of seconds, and it was over again.

A thick layer of ice lay over the concrete, encasing the soldiers. It was a strange sight, with heads and faces, sometimes a hand or foot, breaking the snow white surface.

Their minds were all racing, so many questions flooding them. But there was still more than twenty minutes left until back-up was set to arrive, and there were undoubtedly more soldiers left. Len moved again. He ran across the ice, jumping over the body parts that broke through it here and there. Barry and Mick followed as quickly as they could, but they slipped and slid and struggled to stay on their feet. Both were close to falling on their faces more times than either of them would have liked to admit.

Len was already sitting behind the desk at the guard station when they made it to the end of the long aisle. His eyes were laser focused on the screen in front of him, keys clattering under his hands.

“I think I can get the cells open.” he said as his friends joined him behind the desk.

“No, leave ‘em shut.” Mick said, eyes scanning around for any more soldiers and his finger still itching on the trigger.

“Are you crazy?” Len bit but didn’t stop working. He just had to circumvent the security system then he would have control over the cells. “I am _not_ leaving them in there for a moment longer than I have to.”

Barry groaned to himself. Why was Len being _so fucking stubborn?_ He grabbed the back of the desk chair and dragged Len away from the screens.

“Look at them!” Barry said, pointing to the ‘inmates’. “They’re catatonic. If you open these cells, who knows? They might start wandering! There’s gotta be thirty of them in here alone. We can’t babysit them right now! We need to take care of as many of those fucking soldiers as we can!” he insisted as Len stared at the patients. “Len, if you open these cells, they’ll just get caught in the crossfire. We should wait for back-up.”

“He’s right, Lenny!” Mick said.

He was getting nervous from staying in one place for too long. Those assholes could be watching them right now for all he knew.

“We got people comin’, man.” Mick added. “Twenty minutes more and we’ll be outta here. All of us.”

Len hated this. Lisa was in there somewhere and she no doubt thought that Len was dead; or worse, that he had given up on her. He had the means to find her, _to free her,_ right there in front of him. But they were right. Mick and Barry were right. If Len opened the cells, all these people would end up dead for nothing, when their salvation was just twenty minutes away. Len had to bottle it up. He had to push the fear down for another twenty minutes. Then he could grab Lisa and never let go of her again.


	34. Chapter 34

“Anything, Overwatch?”

Felicity grumbled in Oliver’s ear.  He recognized that sound and he didn’t like it; it meant that she was displeased, which then meant that her search had come up empty.

“Nothing!” she said, and there was a sound not unlike a keyboard being smacked with an open palm. “I don’t understand! I mean, I tracked them all over the city and even then their movements made no sense!”

“What’s that mean?” Diggle asked, scouting a few blocks away from Oliver’s position.

“They went to a house in the suburbs on the west side, stayed for twenty minutes, then to a church where they stopped for ten minutes then back over to the east side for an hour!” Felicity listed fast enough for anyone, other than Oliver and Dig, to lose track of her words. _“Then_ they jumped around the city and I got a bunch of chatter on the police band about shots fired, a gang of known gun runners were arrested and hospitalized, then a car was stolen a block away from the last incident. I tracked them going out of the city through the south but I lost them after they left the main roads. Haven’t spotted them since.”

“What about satellites?” Roy asked, he and Thea scoping out the west side where the gang had been spotted. “Can’t you track the car via satellite images? There’s gotta be some kinda…live video somewhere or some shit, right?”

“Everyone shut up!” Felicity ordered suddenly. “I’m getting another call.”

“What? Another call?” Oliver huffed. “Since when do yo-“

 _“Shush!”_ Felicity practically shouted, which made everyone but Oliver snort.

*

“Oh, Lord!” Felicity rambled as soon as she came back on the line. “Oh, God, oh, jeez. Oh, this is new. This is very, very new, and very, very not good at all. You need to get moving! You need to go! Now!” she shouted at the agents. “Get a car and ge-“

 _“Felicity!”_ Oliver interrupted. “Take a breath, and tell us what you’re talking about.”

The technician breathed deep, seemingly calming down.

“Just get a car, and head out of the city!” she ordered then. “Wells has been detained, and Caitlin Snow is the Interim Director! She’s cancelled the kill orders on Snart, Rory, and Allen! I’m sending you coordinates right now. Coordinate with FBI, DHS, and the army on site. I don’t know what is going on, but _it is huge_! Every other agent in the damn state is on their way too!”

“Copy that!” the agents chorused back at her.

“Spartan, grab a car and pick me up at the Freemont Building on Eighth.” Oliver ordered rapidly as they all jumped into motion. “Speedy, Arsenal, head out and clear a path for us!”

“Copy!” they chorused again.

_What the hell was going on and what the hell had Snart and his band of rogues gotten themselves into?_

*

“Sitrep?” Oliver said into his coms.

Dig turned the car onto the dirt road leading up to the coordinates Felicity had supplied. It was dark as hell when Dig shut off the headlights. The city was a glowing orb of orange light on the horizon, skyscrapers silhouetted by the shine.

“We got a…a facility of some kind.” Roy responded in a whisper. “Guards armed to the teeth on patrol, two on the gate.”

“There’re some tire tracks about a mile out.” Thea added, she too keeping her voice low. “Looks like there was a car parked there for a while before it got towed into the facility.”

“That’s gotta be Snart and his gang.” Dig said and Oliver hummed in agreement. “Hey, Speedy, any ideas on an entry point?”

Oliver spotted the motorcycle that had been pushed into the ditch a bit up the road. Thea and Roy had dumped it to minimize the chances of someone spotting the bike from inside the facility. Dig nodded at Oliver’s wordless order, pulling the car over as well. They were both quietly nervous. Hm, probably how Snart and his friends felt when they pulled up the place, supposing by the tire tracks that they too had attempted to sneak into the compound. What was this place? What had they been dragged into?

“Got a small camera blind spot near the northeast corner of the compound.” Thea said. “Arsenal’s working on delaying the alarm so we can cut the fence and get in. How long, Arsenal?”

“I’m done.” Roy responded after some moments. “Cut the fence, and we’ll have two and a half minutes. Not much but it’s all I could buy us.”

“It’s good enough.” Oliver said.

He and Dig moved up the road as quickly and quietly as they could. They moved silently through the darkness just outside the glow of the floodlights, circling through the mud fields around the compound to reach the northeast corner.

“We don’t need to get inside. All we have to do it stall until Snow and the cavalry gets here.” the archer continued. “Overwatch, what’s the clock?”

“ETA nine minutes!” Felicity updated. “She’s moving as fast as she can, but she can only do so much, guys!

“Copy.” Oliver responded.

Both Roy and Thea flinched and raised their bows as Dig and Oliver came up behind them. They lowered their weapons again as soon as they realized who it was, though. Given their location, no one could blame them for being a little twitchy. The young archers put their cutters against the fence. Dig and Oliver readied themselves, breathing deeply. There was no time for screw-ups, mistakes, or missed shots. Felicity hadn’t given them much information, but from what she had said…there were a lot of lives at stake.

Oliver counted them down.

He hit _Go!_ and they started cutting. Roy went from the top, moving down and cutting as quickly as he could. Thea did the same, going from the ground up. They met in the middle, ripping the fence open. Dig leapt through, with Oliver close behind. The men moved to the left, which would circle them back to them front of the complex. Thea stepped through after them and Roy followed her. They circled right, to the back of the facility.

“Light it up.” Oliver whispered into the coms. “Take out as many as you can.”

There was no need for anyone to respond back. The sound of Digs gunfire and the explosive arrows of the archers did all the talking for them.


	35. Chapter 35

By Mick’s count, they had less than ten minutes left before back-up arrived.

They had to stick it out for another ten minutes, less even, and that was it. Then they would be saved. Every innocent prisoner there would be saved and taken care of, while the soldiers and the scientists would be  _ punished_. If not by the government, then by Mick himself. He would pay that Zolomon asshole back tenfold.  _ A thousand-fold. _ He needed to pay for this. For all the suffering he had caused. He and Director Wells.

“I ’m out!” Barry shouted.

“Me too!” Mick replied.

They were pinned down in one of the barren hallways, hiding between steel support beams that gave slight cover as long as the agents kept their guts sucked in. This was not good. They were going to die there; none of them doubted that now. Back-up was coming, but it might as well be a million miles away. Their ‘ _powers’ _ were unreliable and uncontrollable, and they were out of ammo. There was nowhere for them to go and no one to help them. This was truly the ending for the three of them. Tears were pouring down Lens face. He wouldn’t admit it, but they were there.  _ Fuck_, he was so scared.

He would like to hope they all took some solace in knowing that despite their deaths, back-up would come. They would come, and all the innocent victims trapped in their cells would be  _ saved_. Len considered it some small measure of comfort, knowing that at least their deaths wouldn’t be in vain. Even if he died, Lisa would be saved and she would live, and she would know that he hadn’t given up on her; that he could never in a million years, give up on her.

“Cease fire!” one of the soldiers shouted, and the others let off their triggers. “We have you surrounded! Come out with your hands up!”

Mick’s gut was bubbling. He was nervous and  _ angry and scared and anxious_, it was a hot mess of emotions mixing together inside him. The moment they stepped out, they would open fire again.  _ Barry might be fast enough to dodge the bullets, _ Mick thought to himself,  _ but Len and he certainly were not. _ Maybe if he ran at one of the line ups, tackled a few of the soldiers and drew fire, Len and Barry could get out at least.

“Mick!” Len yelled suddenly.

The man’s head whipped around to look at his friend, fear filling his eyes.  _ Was Len hit? Did they hit him? Was he hurt? _

“Mick! Your arm!” Barry shouted a second later.

He tore his eyes away, looking down at his own arm.  _ What was this…? His…his hand was on fire. The flames licked at his skin and the heat was there, but it didn’t hurt. _

In a flash,  _ in a split-second, _ the fire spread. It moved up his arm, over his head, and ate up the rest of him. He was… _consumed_ by the flames. The heat of an entire sun seemed to lay against him, _yet it didn’t hurt._ Weirder still, the flames refused to eat up his clothes. Even though the fire burned like a forge, the black suit prevailed, as if by his pure will he was making it remain.

Len and Barry stared at him in shock, the orange lights casting shadows over their faces and reflecting in their eyes.

_ Len and Barry… _

No, Len and Barry!

Mick sucked down a lungful of air, then threw himself forward out of cover. He let out a roar fit for the core of the sun. The flames caught the air. The air itself became pure fire, the oxygen burning hot. The flames bent to Mick’s will, to his slightest thought. The explosion filled the whole tunnel. The soldiers screamed as the fire consumed them, but the roar of the flames drowned out every other sound and left nothing behind.

The moment Mick stepped out from cover, Len was afraid. For both Mick, and himself and Barry. He didn’t know what Mick was capable of now, with these… _powers _ that they all had somehow. Mick had tended to ‘blow up’ sometimes before, but  _ now_? What the hell would happen now? But if Lens own  _ powers_, for lack of a better word, were to do with ice and cold…maybe he would be safe from the heat. What about Barry though? All those thoughts, all those fears, went through his head in a slit-second. Len turned on his toes, standing in front of Barry with his arms on either side of the kid’s body.

As the fire erupted around them, Len was once again filled to the brim with ice. In half a moment, his ice spread out of his body. It reached out from him, and enveloped both he and Barry in a thick cocoon. Len could actually  _ feel _ the fire beat against the wall of ice and frost.

For every millimetre it melted through, ten grew back. Len couldn’t let Barry die now. Not when they were so close to the end. All he could think about was family; Barry’s family, and how they wold feel if Len let Barry die in fire, and Lisa, how she would never know how much he loved her, and Mick, stupid fucking Mick with his stupid hot temper that always messed things up but  _ fuck it all _ because he was Lens brother.

*

“Copy that, Madam Director!” Oliver heard Felicity say on the comms, obviously speaking to Snow. “Arrow! Director’s three minutes out! She wants you to make an entry point into the building, clear as much of a path as you can!”

“Copy!” Oliver said, releasing an arrow into a cluster of guards and clicked the trigger button on his bow once it hit one. It exploded into a burst of tear gas which dropped them all to their knees. “You got that, Speedy?!”

“Got it!” Thea responded, throwing a last punch at a guard who had ran at her. “Keep ‘em busy, boys! I’ll get on it!”  


The girl wasted no time. There  _ was _ no time to waste. Three minutes until back-up was on scene, civilians inside, operatives under the gun.

“I’m branching in a few more agents!” Felicity said, as Thea began to scope for weak-spots. “We’ve got Rainbow Raider, Double Down, Weather Wizard, Black Siren and White Canary, Girder, Blackout, and Multiplex comin’ in hot!”

_ “Heard you needed some help!” _   


That was the Canary’s voice,  _ Sarah_, followed by a grunt of exertion that could only mean she just knocked some poor sap out.

“Much appreciated!” Diggle called over gunshots.

“Less talk,” Oliver ordered. ”-more fighting! Catch up later!”

Laurel’s melodic laughter filled their ear.  _ “Yessir!” _ she said playfully.

Though the battle hadn’t been close to being lost before they arrived, the scales were certainly tipped in the favour of  _ ‘good’ _ when they did. Sure, the four of them were highly trained operatives, but there were still only four of them. Going up against an army of sell-swords, their odds hadn’t exactly been great. But with eight more agents to take some of the heat, the fight felt a hell of a lot more fair.

Thea dodged as much of the fighting as she could. With Double Down and the Raider falling in on her heels to clear a path, she could focus on her objective. Right now, breaking the facility open was her goal. The doors were a definite no-go. Too thick to blast through, too many guys prepped and waiting inside. Blasting through a wall would be the best option. The building she was circling looked like an old storage warehouse; the walls looked to be corrugated sheet metal, nothing special, easy to blow through. The tunnel from the warehouse to the main building; twenty foot wide sheets, bolted seams,  _ that’s it. _

“Double! Raider!” she shouted.

The men glanced away from their separate fights, signalling that they heard.

“C4!” she ordered then.

Double took down the last of his lot. He ripped open one of the pockets on his tactical vest and got out a standard brick of C4. Thea caught it easily when he lobbed it to her. Raider followed suit once Double jumped in to help with the Raiders remaining three.

“Cover me!”

“Copy!” the men shouted.

Thea ripped one of the bricks in half, no need to over-do it. She smashed the clay against the wall, but jumped back as soon as she touched the metal, as if struck by lightning. The metal... _it was red-hot! _ Like someone was holding a blowtorch right to the spot she had touched.  _ What the hell...? _

The metal creaked. The grey paint was cracking.  _ No, _ not cracking.  _ Bubbling? _ Bubbling, sizzling, boiling! Here and there, spots of yellow and red began to break through the grey. What was happening? This could  _ not _ be good.

“Get back!” Thea screamed. “Go! Go, run!”

She followed her own advice. She turned on a dime and set off in whatever direction was  _ away _ from the tunnel. Double and Raider stared, as if turned to stone, as she blew past them.

 _ “Fire in the hole!” _ she yelled to anyone that was listening.

At that, her current partners in crime seemed to break out of their petrified state. At another time, perhaps the three of them running for their lives like a pack of chickens with their heads cut off would have been a comical sight. Presently, though, everyone was more concerned with the explosion that was apparently about to happen.

And  _ happen _ it did.

Though Thea had placed no C4 and certainly no detonators, the tunnel blew. Fire filled the sky, consuming the darkness and flooding the world with light. Everything seemed to stop, all eyes on this strange brightness that had appeared from nothing. Scraps of sheet metal fell from the sky like meteors. The people, soldiers and agents alike, scrambled and ran for cover, forgetting to fight. As though gasoline had learned to make clouds, fire rained down over them. What was burning? What was the fuel? What could burn like  _ this_, explode like C4 but rain like oil and persist like napalm?

“Speedy!” Oliver shouted. “ _Speedy, can you hear me?! _ Do you copy, Speedy?! Thea! _T_ _hea_!”

Thea groaned, from where she lay crammed in under a truck with Double and Raider to keep her company.

“I copy, Arrow.” she said, then had to cough at the thick smoke.

“ _Jesus, Thea! _ ” Oliver continued, but was obviously relieved. “How much C4 did you use?”

The girl took a raspy breath; the smoke seemed to cling to her windpipe, making every inhale itch like hell.

_ “That, _ wasn’t me.”


End file.
